, 
 in their way as anything in this world ever gets to 
 
 THE MATE OF THE DAYLIGHT. i8mo, $1.25. 
 
 This volume contains a collection of tales from Miss Jewett s facile 
 pen, which have the charm and brightness which distinguish all her 
 work, and also that combined strength and grace of touch which has 
 won her a foremost place among writers of short stories. 
 
 COUNTRY BY-WA YS. i8mo, gilt top, $1.25. 
 
 Her portraiture of New England characters and scenes is inimitable. 
 The Critic (New York). 
 
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 It is a common thing to say about a book that it is charming, or 
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 ticular meaning or interest. But here is a book which is really all 
 three. Boston Transcript. 
 
 OLD FRIENDS AND NEW. " Little Classic" style. i8mo, 
 
 $1.25. 
 
 Seven charming short stories. . . . The autumn is not > likely to 
 bring anything more wholly delightful to lovers of the best light liter 
 ature. New York Evening Post. 
 
 PLA Y DA YS. Stories for Children. Square i6mo, $1.50. 
 
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 we take him for. Boston Transcript. 
 
 *** For sale by Booksellers, or sent, post-paid, on receipt of price 
 by the Publishers, 
 
 HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN & CO., BOSTON, MASS. 
 
The Mate of the Daylight 
 
 AND FRIENDS ASHORE 
 
 BY 
 
 SARAH ORNE JEWETT 
 
 BOSTON 
 
 HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY 
 
 New York: 11 East Seventeenth Street 
 
 ftfje BtberstUe Press, Camforftge 
 
 1884 
 
Copyright, 1883, 
 BY SARAH ORNE JEWETT. 
 
 11 rights reserved. 
 
 The Riverside Press, Cambridge: 
 Electrotypecl and Printed by II. 0. Uoughton & Co 
 
vn 
 
 To 
 
 A. F. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 THE MATE OF THE DAYLIGHT 1 
 
 A LANDLESS FARMER ...... 34 
 
 A NEW PARISHIONER ....... 94 
 
 AN ONLY SON ........ 148 
 
 Miss DEBBY S NEIGHBORS . 190 
 
 TOM S HUSBAND ....... 210 
 
 THE CONFESSION OF A HOUSE-BREAKER . . . 234 
 
 A LITTLE TRAVELER ,.... 244 
 
THE MATE OF THE DAYLIGHT. 
 
 THREE ancient seafaring men were sitting together 
 in the doorway of a building that looked as if it might 
 once have been the warehouse of a fisherman, but 
 was now entirely out of repair, even for a fish-house. 
 A short, thin old fellow, who looked more active than 
 the rest, was perched on the top of a shaky barrel, 
 swinging his feet ; but his two companions, mindful, 
 perhaps, of their rheumatic joints, were enthroned 
 on bait-tubs. Out-doors it was almost raining, the 
 Scotch mist was coming in so thick from sea ; and the 
 men were taking all the comfort they could in smok 
 ing such strong black tobacco, in dingy clay pipes 
 with no stem to speak of, that the spiders overhead 
 thought it might be best to go out from, their shelter, 
 and brave the inclemency of the weather. 
 
 " I don t see no prospect of a change," said Cap 
 tain Joseph Ryder, the man on the barrel. " The 
 wind backed in yisterday, and the clouds has been 
 a-looking greasy for a week past. I told Dan l, 
 1 
 
2 THE MATE OF THE DAYLIGHT. 
 
 yisterday, he was a blamed fool to go out ; but young 
 fellers, they do set an awful sight by their own opin 
 ion." 
 
 " What was he a-saying ? " asked one of the other 
 men, leaning toward his companion, and putting his 
 hand to his ear. He looked very cross, but he was 
 really good-natured ; it seemed as if he thought he 
 ought to wear a look of disapproval at the behavior 
 of men in general. His clothes were made of thick, 
 stiff cloth, and his very skin was so seasoned by long 
 exposure to the weather that it looked like the hide 
 of a very f air-complexion ed alligator, or of some 
 other creature that is covered with most durable ma 
 terial. 
 
 Captain Joseph Ryder s remarks were reported 
 with some accuracy to Captain Jabez Ryder, and he 
 nodded his head once or twice in approval. " That 
 was all you obsarved, wa n t it?" he asked in a 
 grumbling, rusty voice, as if he thought his friend 
 might have defrauded him in the repetition. " Well, 
 young folks is fools, so they is. It ain t what I 
 call good seamanship, and I like to see good sea 
 manship aboard of a dory as well as aboard of a nine- 
 hunderd-ton East Indiaman, so I do. Ef a man s good 
 for anything whatever aboard a vessel, he can turn his 
 hand to one as well as another. In my day young 
 
THE MATE OF THE DAYLIGHT. 3 
 
 folks used to have ambition about em to rise ; but 
 some o these fellers goes out to the fishing year in 
 and year out, and never leaves off no better than they 
 begun, so they don t." 
 
 " Times ain t what they used to be," mourned Cap 
 tain Peter ; and as old Jabez looked at him inquir- 
 ingty, he repeated his remark at the top of his voice, 
 which was somewhat feeble at best. 
 
 " No more they ain t," said Jabez, with satisfaction, 
 and they all puffed silently at their pipes. They 
 were like some worn old driftwood at the harbor- 
 side, and they bore a queer family likeness to the 
 worm-eaten pieces of ship timber and the small rusty 
 anchor with a broken fluke which were stored away 
 near them. 
 
 The fish-house fronted on a narrow alley-way, 
 which led from the main street of the town down to 
 a wharf. It was standing a little askew, having been 
 built at a time when perfectly straight streets were 
 not thought necessary. In fact, the whole town had 
 a strange, disorderly look, as if its buildings had been 
 brought all at once and- set down wherever there was 
 room, but the inhabitants had never thought it worth 
 while to take the trouble to arrange them better. It 
 gave one a feeling of gratitude that some of the little 
 houses had not been carelessly dumped on their sides. 
 
4 THE MATE OF THE DAYLIGHT. 
 
 or upside down, which would have made house-keep 
 ing in them even more inconvenient than it was. As 
 one went along the streets, some of the buildings 
 stood cornerwise, and some had their back doors 
 where the front should have been ; the whole little 
 town was like a company of soldiers which had 
 broken ranks, and it was altogether picturesque and 
 charming, with its unexpected lilac bushes and bits 
 of garden, and its windowed roofs and narrow, cobble- 
 stoned streets. 
 
 Opposite the fish-house was the gray and lichen ed, 
 rough-shingled wall of a deserted warehouse, and as 
 the three captains sat looking solemnly at this, and 
 past the corner of it toward the water, there suddenly 
 appeared the figure of a young girl against the dull 
 background. She had been walking fast, and her 
 face was flushed with the damp fog and her eager 
 ness. "I ve been hunting all round for you, grand 
 father," she said. " I suppose you forgot about that 
 fish for the chowder ? Aunt Melinda said I had bet 
 ter come right out and look you up, else we should 
 n t get much of a dinner to-day." 
 
 Captain Ryder looked very sorry for this omission, 
 and got down quickly from his barrel, while Captain 
 Jabez put his hand to his ear, and demanded an ex 
 planation of the sudden summons. He was a little 
 
THE MATE OF THE DAYLIGHT. 5 
 
 disappointed at finding it was only that bis crony had 
 forgotten to buy a fish ; it seemed to him that an 
 unexpected guest must have arrived, or that some 
 one was taken suddenly ill, or had died, for Susan 
 was in such a hurry. But if he had stopped to think 
 he might have been sufficiently surprised : it was sel 
 dom that a retired shipmaster in that port forgot to 
 order his dinner ; it was too often the only real busi 
 ness which interfered with his idleness all day long. 
 
 " Cap n Joe," as his friends called him, hurried off 
 by the way of the wharves, apologizing to himself 
 as he went ; but Susan lingered behind a moment. 
 " Do you know whether Dan Lewis is out or not to 
 day ? " she asked Captain Downs softly, as if afraid 
 of being overheard by her retreating grandfather; 
 and she was answered that the fishing-smack had 
 gone out, in spite of repeated warnings, late the night 
 before. 
 
 " I m afraid Dan l will get hisself into mischief," 
 the old sailor said, while Susan s cheeks grew brighter 
 than ever, and old Captain Jabez looked curiously 
 from one face to the other, and was fairly shaking 
 with impatience. Susan had nothing more to say, 
 but turned quickly, as if much disturbed, and went 
 away, slipping a little on the wet round stones of the 
 paving ; and when she had turned the corner from 
 
6 THE MATE OF THE DAYLIGHT. 
 
 the alley- way into the main street, she walked as fas* 
 as she could toward home. When she reached the 
 house she shut the door so angrily that the old brass> 
 knocker clacked, and the hanging-lamp, which the 
 captain had brought in his young days from over 
 seas, rattled its chains and jarred and jingled. It 
 was not the custom of the family to come in at the 
 front door, and Miss Melinda Downs appeared sud 
 denly at the head of the crooked little staircase to 
 see what the matter was. She was not dressed for 
 visitors, and she looked relieved when she found it 
 was her niece. " I was afraid you was an agent or 
 somebody," she said. " Did you find father ? " 
 
 " Yes, I did," said Susan, who was very much ex 
 cited ; her eyes were shining, and she looked as if 
 she could hardly keep from crying. " And what s 
 more, I found that Dan has gone off fishing, just as I 
 supposed he would ; and Heaven knows if anybody 
 will ever see him again ! Just like him, and of 
 course he found plenty of fools ready to go with him. 
 There s an awful storm coming, and the schooner 
 was n t half ready for sea ; he told me so last night, 
 and they sailed before morning." 
 
 "They can t have got far," said Miss Melinda, 
 not without some anxiety. " I guess you d find they 
 was laying off here in the harbor, if the fog lifted. 
 
THE MATE OF THE DAYLIGHT. 7 
 
 There ain t been a breath of wind all the morning ; 
 it s dreadful close. I dare say they 11 put into some 
 other port to fit themselves out, if it s so they don t 
 come right in here again. Just like Dan s nonsense, 
 all fire and tow ! I s pose he thought t would sound 
 smart. I hope he split up a few kindlin s for his 
 poor, feeble old mother before he went. I see her, 
 when I come by yisterday, hacking away in the 
 wood-house with a dull axe. I should think he d be 
 ashamed to go strutting round the way he does. 
 Father went right off to see about the fish, I s pose? 
 I don t know what time he ll get his dinner. I never 
 knew him to forgit before," she added, prudently 
 trying to change the subject, for she saw how Susan s 
 eyes flashed. 
 
 " I guess they ain t laying off in the harbor," re 
 joined the younger woman, stamping her foot with 
 rage. " It s a mercy if they ain t gone to pieces on 
 the rocks, before now. It blew dreadful hard along 
 towards morning. And I 11 just tell you one thing : 
 I don t blame Dan Lewis one mite for being mad, 
 and I ain t going to live here no longer, like a toad 
 under a harrow. I m just going to do as I m a 
 mind to, quick s ever I m out of my time ; and I m 
 going to marry Dan Lewis, whether anybody says I 
 can or not. No fellow would stand what was said to 
 him last night." 
 
8 THE MATE OF THE DAYLIGHT. 
 
 "There, there," said aunt Melinda, soothingly; 
 " don t get so worked up, Susan. Your gran ther 
 means to do well by you ; I m sure he always has, 
 arid he s all for your good. His bark s worse than 
 his bite, you know s well as I do." 
 
 "Nobody wants to hear him bark as I know on," 
 said Susan, scornfully ; and Melinda escaped with the 
 excuse of the captain s coming in at the kitchen door, 
 fish in hand. 
 
 " Let her alone," whispered the elder woman, to 
 her father, who had an anxious look, as if he half 
 expected a battle. She s dreadful worked up about 
 Dan s going off. but she 11 get over it if you don t 
 say nothing to set her going." 
 
 Nothing was farther from the captain s mind than 
 to wish for an encounter with Susan. She did not 
 meet him until dinner was ready, when she came 
 down to take her seat at the table like a sulky and 
 displeased guest. She always helped to get dinner, 
 and that day she had told herself several times, dur 
 ing the hour that she spent in her own room, that 
 she would not go down to share the noonday meal ; 
 but the chowder s savory odor was wafted up the 
 stairs, and proved irresistible, for she was a young 
 person of good appetite, and she was, for some 
 reason or other, hungrier than usual. The captain 
 
THE MATE OF THE DAYLIGHT. 9 
 
 made awkward attempts at keeping up a brisk and 
 unconscious talk, but Susan s expression was that of 
 grim stolidity. She made herself look very ugly 
 when it pleased her to feel so ; she was at other times 
 a pretty girl, with a fine color, as we have already 
 seen, and bright black eyes, that took quick, sharp 
 glances at the world. She was generally good-hu 
 mored and merry, but when a cloud went over her 
 sky it was very bad weather indeed. After dinner 
 Captain Ryder went to sleep in his chair, as usual, 
 and his injured granddaughter helped clear away the 
 table and wiped the dishes, as if it ought not to have 
 been expected of her under the circumstances. Then 
 she withdrew again to her bedroom, and her aunt Me- 
 linda, who never took afternoon naps, after a suitable 
 interval put on her second-best bonnet and shawl, and 
 went out, closing the door gently after her. The 
 house was still, and the captain slept later than 
 usual. When he waked it was half-past three, and 
 he had promised to be on one of the tumble-down 
 wharves at three, to measure some firewood. His 
 neck was stiff, and he had an uneasy sense of guilt 
 as he wondered what had become of the women 
 folks, and especially of Susan. 
 
 After Susan had left the fish-house, that morning, 
 
10 THE MATE OF THE DAYLIGHT. 
 
 the two captains had waited for a few minutes, to be 
 sure she was out of hearing, and then Captain Jabez 
 had edged his overturned bait-tub as close as possible 
 to his companion s, and asked to hear what had been 
 said. " I guess they must ha had some trouble 
 amongst em last night," he said, not without con 
 tempt. " I seen him a-settin by the fore-room win 
 dow, as I was a-passin by, near about eight o clock, 
 if I don t disremember. Cap n Joe, he was out some 
 where ; likely he went over to inquire for Mis Cap n 
 Stark. I met him a-goin home, and it may be he 
 turned Dan l out o the house, and he s made off. I 
 could n t get no sight at what drove him out to sea 
 this miser ble weather. And did n t it bear on your 
 mind that Cap n Joe was some out o sperits ? Acted 
 like he d lost his reck nin , so he did ! " 
 
 " He wa n t out o sperits s I know on," said Cap 
 tain Peter. " I see him coming out o Tarbell s shop 
 just afore ten, and I guess he had his nipper aboard. 
 T ain t often he forgits it ; but I did think he was 
 airlier than common to-day. P raps he d mistook 
 the hour, but most like he wanted it to stay him." 
 
 " T ain t never well to change hours, so it ain t," 
 said Captain- Jabez, after some reflection. "And ten s 
 too airly ; you lose all the good on t by dinner time. 
 I don t blame Joe ; he s been a saving man, and it 
 
THE MATE OF THE DAYLIGHT. 11 
 
 ain t bis natur to want Dan Lewis to make ducks 
 and drakes of his property. I suppose he must have 
 as much as nine or ten thousand, ain t he ? " 
 
 " He s got that, sure," acknowledged Captain 
 Downs. But they had too often settled the amount 
 of money which belonged to every man of their ac 
 quaintance to make the subject an absorbing one, if 
 there were any other at hand. " Dan Lewis is a 
 high-strung fellow, and I never set no great by him," 
 he went on ; " but young folks will have their way, 
 and old folks has to stand back. I should ha 
 thought Susan would ha looked higher. Dan ain t 
 got nothing to look to from his folks ; it s been all 
 his mother could do to scratch along ; and to be sure, 
 he s got the berth o second mate o the Daylight, 
 but with the plight navigation s in now it s lucky 
 if she goes out o her dock for a year to come. His 
 uncle only give him the place because poor old Mis 
 Lewis beseeched him so. Dan s lazy as a flounder, 
 naterally. He never d a undertook to carry on fish 
 ing if he had n t wanted to stand well in Cap n Joe s 
 books. Susan s distressed to get him, ain t she, s if 
 he was an East Indiaman loaded to the water s edge ? 
 Talk about love ! I should think a gal like her 
 would have sense enough to look ahead and provide 
 for herself accordin to. All the Ryder girls, her 
 
12 THE MATE OF THE DAYLIGHT. 
 
 father s sisters, married cap ns, and I sh d think she d 
 have some ambition. But I s pose she s lookin 
 for ard to having means enough o her own, when 
 Joe s done with it. I d like to see who 11 beat, 
 though, her or Joe ! They ain t neither one on em 
 liable to change their minds. Susan s a reg lar chip 
 o the old block." 
 
 Captain Jabez was having an unusually pleasant 
 morning. He could hear the voice of this friend 
 easily, and Captain Peter Downs was a good-na 
 tured, sociable old fellow, who was willing to gossip 
 with this deafest and dullest of his neighbors rather 
 than not gossip at all. Captain Jabez had heard this 
 long discourse with great satisfaction. He did not 
 often find people willing to tell him secrets ; but 
 there was a good opportunity in that secluded spot, 
 and voices could be raised to shouting pitch, and 
 subjects discussed without fear of outside listeners. 
 
 u I s pose she s got the right to suit herself ; she s 
 the one that s going to marry the fellow," said Cap 
 tain Downs, in conclusion. 
 
 But this sentiment did not find favor with Captain 
 Jabez, who prided himself on nothing more than his 
 experience of life and his knowledge of human na 
 ture. "I don t agree with ye, so I don t," he re 
 marked, looking at a great silver watch, and making 
 
THE MATE OF THE DAYLIGHT. 13 
 
 ready to start for home. " Whoever a gal picks out, 
 all her folks has to marry him as much as she does ; 
 and a gal ought to consider whether her folks wants 
 to take a man in for better and worse as a relation. 
 You re a sight more beholden to relations by mar 
 riage than you be to your own folks." 
 
 u I do know but what you re right," meekly ob 
 served Captain Downs, and the two old salts went 
 stiffly away together in search of their dinners. 
 
 It happened that the story, in some mysterious 
 way, found wings and flew about town that Captain 
 Joe Ryder and Dan Lewis had had some hard words, 
 and Susan s frame of mind was indescribable in con 
 sequence. Captain Jabez s wife, a person of great 
 activity, met him at the door at noon with the news, 
 and was very pleased to find that he had seen both 
 Susan and her grandfather, and was wiser in the 
 matter than she. He had often failed in his duty of 
 bringing home the news since he had grown deplor 
 ably deaf. Mrs. Ryder treated him with unusual at 
 tention ; she even delayed dinner a little, while she 
 made a pudding-sauce of which her partner for life 
 was very fond, and which he usually had served him 
 only when there was company. " I do know but if 
 you feel like it we 11 go round to Joseph s to-night, 
 
14 THE MATE OF THE DAYLIGHT. 
 
 after supper," she ventured, when dinner was nearly 
 over, and the captain was unmistakably serene. 
 " He s all the cousin you ve got, and we ain t been 
 there of an evening all through the summer. I Ve 
 got some things I want to consult Melindy about, 
 and like s not they 11 be glad to have us drop in if 
 they ain t feelin comfortable among themselves." 
 
 Captain Jabez was usually much averse to paying 
 ceremonious visits. He was some years older than 
 his wife, and he was generally unable to join in the 
 conversation to any satisfactory extent ; he liked to 
 smoke his pipe and read the newspaper in peace at 
 home. But he consented to this plan with unwonted 
 willingness, though he felt that he must grumble at it 
 a little at first. " I can t go to work a-rigging up just 
 as I m getting off to bed," he growled mildly. But 
 his wife took a good look at him, and said that she 
 did n t know as there would be any need of his put 
 ting on a clean shirt ; it was n t as if it was daytime. 
 Besides, it was different, just dropping in to see your 
 own folks ; she should n t like to appear as if they 
 made much of it. 
 
 So after Mrs. Ryder had stowed away the tea 
 things, and had brought the captain his coat and 
 helped him into it, they started out. It was very 
 late in the summer, and the evenings were growing 
 
THE MATE OF THE DAYLIGHT. 15 
 
 long ; the fog was coming in thicker than ever from 
 sea, and it was already dark. The captain, whose 
 eyes were not much better than his ears, always re 
 fused to go forth after night-fall without his lantern. 
 The old couple steered slowly down the uneven side 
 walk toward their cousin s house. The captain walked 
 with a solemn rolling gait, learned in his many long 
 years at sea, and his wife, who was also short and 
 stout, had caught the habit from him. If they kept 
 step, all went well ; but on this occasion, as some 
 times happened, they did not take the first step out 
 into the world together, so they swayed apart, and 
 then bumped against each other, as they went along. 
 To see the lantern coming through the mist, you 
 might have thought it the light of a small craft at 
 sea in heavy weather. 
 
 " I m most sorry we come out, it s such a bad 
 night, and your rheumatism, too ! " said Mrs. Ryder 
 regretfully in the captain s best ear, which luckily 
 happened to be next her. And the captain rejoined 
 that anybody would think they must be put to it ; 
 but it was none o his doing. 
 
 " I 11 say to Joseph that I want to look over some 
 papers that he keeps, and him and me s concerned 
 in ; that 11 explain it, and they won t think we come 
 a-spyin round." 
 
16 THE MATE OF THE DAYLIGHT. 
 
 Mrs. Ryder s heart had begun to fail her ; she 
 would have turned toward home again just before this, 
 if she could have mustered courage. She thought it 
 was very handsome of the captain, and said to her 
 self that she would not forget it- 
 
 Miss Melinda Ryder and the old captain, her fa 
 ther, had passed a very dull day, and the evening had 
 closed in with uncommon gloom. Susan had main 
 tained a dignified silence at supper time, and had re 
 turned to her room afterward, and shut its door in 
 such a manner that it was plain to see that she had 
 not forgiven the sins of her family against her. For 
 some reason or other the captain had failed to receive 
 his evening paper, and he had nothing to do but look 
 at the small, unwilling fire which his daughter had 
 lighted in the Franklin stove in the dining-room, the 
 evening being chilly. She had forgotten herself, and 
 before she stopped to think had lighted the sticks 
 that topped the careful structure made ready for the 
 fire. They were nice looking round sticks of white 
 birch, and she regretted their loss very much. She 
 was much attached to them, beside ; she had taken 
 them off and laid them by a great many times. Every 
 thing seemed to be awry, and neither she nor the 
 captain would have grieved if they had been sure 
 that Dan Lewis had taken himself off with the de 
 termination never to darken their doors a^ain. 
 
THE MATE OF THE DAYLIGHT. 17 
 
 The knock at the door which they heard presently 
 was most startling, and they could have confessed 
 that they were afraid that the young man had come 
 back and meant to " have it out," and decide his right 
 to Susan. The guests, however, did not wait for 
 an answer to their summons with the knocker, but 
 opened the door at once, and were pleased with the 
 look of delight and relief on the faces of their host 
 and hostess. 
 
 " Step up and spenk to Susan, will you ? " said 
 Captain Joe to his daughter. " Tell her who s here." 
 Melinda obeyed, with much fear and trembling. Su 
 san had forgotten to take a light up-stairs with her. 
 She was not at all sleepy, and she was very tired, to 
 tell the truth, of sitting in the dark. Her manner 
 had a little loftiness, but she was very gracious, and 
 the rest of the company took heart and were cheer 
 ful. Captain Jabez explained the object of his visit 
 to his cousin, and the papers were at once brought 
 out from a hiding-place in the old secretary in the 
 dining-room, which stood in the stead of an office and 
 counting-room to Captain Joe. He was ship s hus 
 band to a small craft in which the cousins were part 
 owners. They talked for some time over the affairs 
 of the Adeline in language intelligible only at times 
 to the unenlightened listener, and in the mean time 
 2 
 
18 THE MATE OF THE DAYLIGHT. 
 
 the three women chatted together softly, at the other 
 side of the room. 
 
 Captain Jabez was in high spirits, and made him 
 self most agreeable. He had always been called 
 good company before his deafness had isolated him in 
 the midst of society ; in his young days he had been 
 a good deal of a beau and gallant, and his wife was 
 proud of him yet, and always said that nobody knew 
 so well as he how to carry things off well. She re 
 fused, on this ground, to grant him permission to ab 
 sent himself from her tea-parties or sewing-society 
 suppers, which were the main features of the town 
 festivities. He had grown very heavy and stupid of 
 late, at least, it seemed so to most of his neigh 
 bors, but this evening call had awakened much of 
 his ancient vivacity. 
 
 It was an awful moment to all the rest when he 
 turned, with apparent innocence, to Susan, and said, 
 " Cap n Peter said you was inquiring about Dan 
 Lewis and them that was out fishing?" 
 
 " Yes ! " shouted Susan, with great bravery, her 
 cheeks growing scarlet, 
 
 " I s pose you ve heard by this time that they Ve 
 got in ? I chanced to be down on Sand s wharf when 
 they come ashore, and a more miser ble-looking set o 
 drownded rats I never see ; but they was fools to have 
 
THE MATE OF THE DAYLIGHT. 19 
 
 put out in such weather, so tfley was, and I told em 
 so. Dan l, he said that they got outside and set their 
 trawls in the night ; but there was an old sea a-run- 
 ning, and their trawls parted and caught, so they lost 
 two thirds o one on em. I don t see how they got 
 in. They said they never see no such a fog as there 
 is outside. They worked toward the shore somehow 
 or nother, and after a while they heard the town bell 
 ringing at one o clock, and they steered by that. 
 T was about four o clock when they come in. Dan l 
 said if it had come on to blow, t would a been all 
 day with em. He said he was a fool to go out. The 
 airs seemed to be took out o him a little for once." 
 
 " Glad of it," said Captain Joe, chuckling with de 
 light, while the three women grew more and more 
 uneasy. " Dan l al ays was all talk and no cider." 
 
 Susan looked very black. She had borne with 
 Captain Jabez patiently ; there was no knowing that 
 he had heard the town gossip. But deaf people hear 
 more things that are worth listening to than people 
 with better ears ; one likes to have something worth 
 telling in talking to a person who misses most of the 
 world s talk. 
 
 " I m sorry you forget yourself so as to say such 
 a thing as that," Susan said scornfully to her grand 
 father ; and she spoke loud enough for Captain Jabez 
 
20 THE MATE OF THE DAYLIGHT. 
 
 to hear. " I won t stand by and hear Dan abused. 
 I may as well tell all of you now that I am going 
 to marry him." 
 
 " There, there, Susan ! Don t be hasty," whis 
 pered Miss Melinda Ryder appealingly. The girl 
 looked for a minute as if she could hardly keep from 
 crying. She had been very anxious about her lover, 
 and she was glad enough to hear of his safety ; but 
 she said, after an awful pause of a few minutes, that 
 she could n t see why everybody made such a touse 
 about his going out fishing, any way. It had hap 
 pened times enough before that men had gone out in 
 the night and been caught by the fog. 
 
 " We won t talk no more about it now, Susan," 
 commanded Captain Joe, with an air of offended dig 
 nity, and Susan feared that she had gone too far. It 
 was all very well to hold her own, and she had taken 
 pride all day in her ability to make her grandfather 
 uncomfortable ; but it would not do to provoke him 
 altogether, since he might leave his money in a way 
 that she would regret. And he had always been very 
 kind to her until lately, when she had been calling 
 him a tyrant, and had pleased herself with consid 
 ering him her enemy. 
 
 The proverb with which Captain Joe had roused 
 this battle about his ears had left a suggestion in his 
 
THE MATE OF THE DAYLIGHT. 21 
 
 mind, and he rose from his chair, while the rest of 
 the company were trying to collect the stray bits of 
 conversation which were left in their shocked minds ; 
 and, taking the small hand-lamp from the secretary 
 and a pitcher from the closet, he went down cellar, 
 and drew some of the ale which the mention of talk 
 and cider had made him remember. 
 
 " It s out of a little kag that Aleck Jones sent me 
 for a present last week," he explained, as he came 
 puffing up the stairs. " Git some glasses, will you, 
 Melinda?" 
 
 Captain Jabez coughed gravely, and the ale proved 
 very good, and all seemed fair weather again. Susan 
 looked shyly up at her grandfather s face as he gave 
 her a tumbler. She was not fond of ale, but she did 
 not like to refuse this. She could not help noticing 
 that the old man s hand shook, and that he looked 
 hurt and tired. He took no notice of her, appar 
 ently ; he had grown very old this last year, she 
 thought, and she was sorry she had been so angry 
 with him. But she would teach folks to let Dan 
 Lewis and herself alone. 
 
 Captain Jabez and his wife set sail on their home 
 ward voyage at an early hour. They expressed a 
 fear that the fog might turn to rain, and the lantern 
 went bobbing and swaying up the street. " What 
 
22 THE MATE OF THE DAYLIGHT. 
 
 possessed you to get going about Dan Lewis ? " 
 asked Mrs. Jabez, reproachfully. " You spoilt every 
 thing, and we was having such a pleasant talk, all of 
 us." 
 
 " I wanted to stir her up," answered the captain, 
 composedly. " I never did like that girl over well. 
 I don t think she s got no sort o gratitude, after all 
 that s been done for her. She got a piece o my 
 mind about that fellow s going on, so she did." 
 
 " It don t do no good," said his wife. " and you Ve 
 got no more sense than a boy. Why did n t you tell 
 me they d come in ? " To which the captain made 
 no answer, taking refuge in his deafness, though he 
 could always hear what his wife said, being so well 
 used to her voice. 
 
 Captain Joe Ryder came back to the dining-room, 
 after bolting and locking the fore-door behind his 
 visitors. " I guess I 11 make for bed," he said. " And, 
 Susan, I ve got one thing I want to say to you : 
 I Ve treated you as well as I knew how, and I Ve 
 done for your good ever since you was left a baby ; 
 and if I don t want you to fling yourself away on a 
 worthless fellow that can t call a dollar his own, I 
 don t know as I m to blame for it. And I think 
 you Ve let yourself down, speaking so smart to me 
 afore folks ; it hurt my feelin s." 
 
TEE MATE OF THE DAYLIGHT. 23 
 
 Susan began to cry. " I m sure you re always 
 hurtin mine," said she. " I can t help it if I do like 
 him ; and there s lots of fellows that start without 
 any means, and get rich soon enough." 
 
 The captain turned back as he heard this. " He 
 don t come of a good stock, and I should rather he 
 showed me five thousand dollars in his hand than 
 have him promise he was going make it. I and my 
 father before me lived single till we owned that much 
 money, and if you d seen as much of this world as 
 I have you d think we done right. You wait till 
 you re as old as I be, and you 11 look at most things 
 different from what you do now. I always have 
 calc lated on seeing you well married and settled 
 afore I m laid away, and I hope to yet ; but there s 
 no sense in marrying a fellow just because he s 
 good-lookin and has a smart way with him," and the 
 captain shut his bedroom door behind him, and said 
 no more. 
 
 Susan considered herself to be in a position of 
 great misery, and she sat by the window and cried as 
 long as she could, after she went up-stairs. She 
 pitied herself very much, and yet she had a great 
 respect for herself as the heroine of an unhappy love 
 affair. 
 
 But in the morning affairs wore a different aspect. 
 
24 THE MATE OF THE DAYLIGHT. 
 
 Dan Lewis came in soon after breakfast, looking ex 
 cited and pleased, and as if he had something to say 
 that would make him welcome. Captain Joe spoke 
 to him civilly, and the women bade him good-morn 
 ing, and looked at him curiously, for they were sure 
 he had important news. 
 
 " I came to tell you that I got a letter from my 
 uncle last night, sir," he told the captain, " and he 
 says that the Daylight is going to sail as quick as 
 they can fit her out, and he wants me aboard right 
 away. I m going on to New York this afternoon." 
 
 " Oh, Dan ! " cried Susan, with real distress. 
 " Can t you put it off until to-morrow ? " But Dan 
 went on talking to the captain. 
 
 " My uncle says she s going to Liverpool in bal 
 last, but the owners are sure of getting a freight 
 there for the East Indies. They re going to send 
 her along, anyhow, for there s nothing doing in 
 freights in New York, and " 
 
 " Right they are, too," interrupted the captain. 
 "I was reading the other day how freights were 
 looking up on the other side, and they was short of 
 ships, for a wonder. It was betwixt hay and grass 
 with em, and bad head-winds had delayed a good 
 many vessels bound for English ports. And you 11 
 have a quick run across ; it s a first-rate time o year. 
 
THE MATE OF THE DAYLIGHT. 25 
 
 Well, I wish you a good v y ge, my boy, and a safe 
 return," said the captain, heartily, feeling the kinship 
 of sailor with sailor, and forgetting his dislike for the 
 man himself. 
 
 Dan took courage from the captain s cordiality, 
 and with a glance at Susan, who stood listening, with 
 her eyes full of tears, he said, " If I do well, I hope 
 you ve no objections to my asking Susan " 
 
 The old man s face looked black for a minute, but 
 he quickly recovered himself. " Not if you do well, 
 I have n t, Dan ; but a second mate s berth ain t 
 much of a business in the state navigation s in now. 
 But if you show you mean to do well, and I hear a 
 good report of you, I sha n t have anything to say 
 against it, if so be that you keep of the same mind, 
 both of you. You ve got just as good a chance as 
 the next one, if you re willing to put right to ; and 
 there s money to be earnt yet followin the sea, bad 
 as times is. You young folks thinks that love s the 
 main p int, and I don t say but what it is ; but there s 
 a good deal more chance for it to hold out when 
 there s means to make things comfortable. And you 
 ought to want Susan to have a good home full as 
 much as I do." 
 
 " I do set everything by her," said the young 
 sailor ; but he looked humbled at this announcement 
 
26 THE MATE OF THE DAYLIGHT. 
 
 of what would be expected of him as to material 
 comforts. 
 
 " I Ve only got one thing more to say to you," the 
 captain added. " If I do hear good accounts of you, 
 and have reason to think you Ve done well, I 11 help 
 you out any way I can. I know you have n t got 
 any folks of your own to look to. It ain t as if 
 your uncle had n t met with bad luck of late years." 
 
 " He s doing very well this past year," said Dan, 
 with as much pride as he dared show ; " and he says 
 he means to push me ahead as fast as he can." 
 
 " Better look to yourself for that," said Captain 
 Joe, gravely. " Talk s cheap ; " and, Miss Melinda 
 having been called to the door by some one who had 
 come with an errand, he went out to the garden, 
 which lay behind the house, and left the lovers to 
 themselves. Susan cried, but the mate of the Day 
 light was not moved to grief; he consoled her as best 
 he could, and with great kindness, and showed her 
 that he carried her picture in his waistcoat pocket, 
 and told her that he should kiss it every day. And 
 then he kissed her several times, and promised to 
 write and to think of her ; and altogether they were 
 very sad and affectionate, being much in love, and 
 feeling that they were hardly used by fortune, since, 
 if Captain Joe had ever said the word, they would 
 
THE MATE OF THE DAYLIGHT. 27 
 
 have been married, and Dan would have willingly 
 taken up his residence in the home of Susan s child 
 hood. He meant to settle down into the business and 
 idleness of fishing and coasting, and of doing great 
 things with Captain Joe s savings by and by, when 
 he had the opportunity. And he certainly was the 
 handsomest young man in town. Susan watched him 
 proudly through her tears, as he hurried away at last. 
 His mind was full of going down the street to tell 
 his acquaintances of his prospects and his long voy 
 age ; and afterward he must go home to toss his be 
 longings into his sea-chest, and say good-by to his 
 mother. She was old and in ill-health, and the 
 thought struck him sharply that he might not find 
 her there to welcome him when the voyage was over 
 and he came home again. 
 
 By noon of that day he had gone. The people of 
 the town were used to their neighbors going away to 
 sea, and so Dan s departure did not make a great ex 
 citement. The subject of his relations with the Ryder 
 family was discussed for a while, but it was decided 
 that he was not engaged to Susan, and that affairs 
 were left in the state they had been in for some time 
 before. 
 
 Many months afterward, in the middle of a pleas- 
 
28 THE MATE OF THE DAYLIGHT. 
 
 ant September afternoon, Miss Melinda Ryder took 
 a solitary walk to the old bury ing-ground on the 
 hill. As we have heard, all her sisters had married 
 captains, and Melinda herself had been promised to 
 a young man, who was unfortunately drowned on his 
 first voyage as master. She had never replaced him 
 in her affection ; her love and loyalty grew stronger 
 and stronger instead of fading away. She had been 
 expecting to marry him in a few weeks, when his 
 homeward voyage should have ended, and on high 
 days and holidays ever since she had looked sadly 
 through the old sea-chest of her father s, that held 
 many of the treasures that her lover had given her, 
 and what was left of her now quaint and old-fash 
 ioned wedding outfit. And once in a while, through 
 the summer weather, she went to this burying- 
 ground, where a stone had been raised in the family 
 lot to his memory, and felt herself at such times, 
 and in fact at many others, to be a widow indeed. 
 It always seemed to her as if that were his grave; 
 at any rate, she felt a greater nearness to him in that 
 spot than in any other. His family, with great con 
 sideration, had asked her advice in the choice of the 
 head-stone, and though she liked marble best, she 
 had chosen a tall, broad slab of slate, on which was 
 cut the familiar figure of a mourner beneath a wil- 
 
THE MATE OF THE DAYLIGHT. 29 
 
 low-tree. She identified this figure with herself 
 always, and it was a matter of great sorrow to her 
 that it would be out of the question for her to be 
 buried at the side of this untenanted grave. She 
 would have been glad if she could have been sure 
 that she would be buried there, but she never dared 
 to express such a wish ; it would sound very strange, 
 she thought, and yet it seemed to her to be her 
 proper resting-place. 
 
 On this day it was very pleasant in the burying- 
 ground. The wind was blowing in from the sea, and 
 the tall, uncared-for grass waved this way find that ; 
 and she read the name of one old acquaintance after 
 another, as she went along a crooked path that 
 wound among the graves. Miss Ryder was already 
 an old woman, and she was tired with her walk, and 
 was glad to stop to rest, as she read for the hun 
 dredth time the name of Captain Joseph Sewall : 
 Lost at Sea. There was no one in sight, and she 
 gently stroked the slate head-stone with her hand, 
 and picked off a gray lichen that had fastened its 
 tenacious roots into the crevice of one of the letters, 
 while the face of her sailor lover came clearly to 
 her mind. She did not know why, but she felt very 
 lonely that day. She and Susan had never been 
 very dear to each other ; it was an affection bred of 
 
30 THE MATE OF THE DAYLIGHT. 
 
 attachment and kinship and long association, rather 
 than an instinctive drawing together of their natures, 
 and she knew that Susan s home was not likely to 
 be hers, and that in all probability her father could 
 not live many years longer ; at his death she would 
 be left alone. Her married sisters were all dead, and 
 Susan s father, her only brother, had died nfany years 
 before. " It s the common lot of all," she told her 
 self, " and I ought to be thankful that it is likely 
 father will leave me very comfortable." 
 
 Susan had been anxious of late about her lover. 
 The letters had not come often at best, for the mate 
 of the Daylight did not hold the pen of a ready 
 writer, and the long voyages from port to port had 
 caused long silences that were nobody s fault. The 
 last report from the ship had been that the next 
 move was undecided ; she might sail for the East In 
 dies again before coming back to the States. There 
 had been heavy gales at sea, and Miss Melinda had 
 felt great sympathy for her niece when she asked the 
 old captain so eagerly every day if there were any 
 letters, and was disappointed by his answer. 
 
 She never had pitied the girl so much as she did 
 when the thought came to her that the ship might be 
 lost and that Susan would have to bear a sorrow like 
 her own. 
 
THE MATE OF Tff<E DAYLIGHT. 31 
 
 And Miss Ryder seated herself on the grass, and 
 sat looking off to sea. How many times she had sat 
 there, and how dark the world used to seem to her 
 when she came there first to show respect for her lover 
 and her tenderness for his memory ! Yet the years 
 had worn away one by one, and this faithful soul had 
 in later days wondered as much about the meeting, at 
 some not far distant time, as she had dwelt in thought 
 over the sad farewell of many years before. 
 
 Miss Ryder made a call or two on her way home, 
 and it was almost tea-time when she reached the 
 house, and heard an unusual noise of voices as she 
 hurried in. What a surprise it was to see young 
 Lewis, grown older and broad-shouldered, with his 
 face browned and reddened by the sea winds ! Susan 
 was beaming with happiness, and Captain Joe looked 
 very pleased and interested, and was listening to a 
 long story of the voyage. Miss Ryder had not pre 
 pared her mind for being kissed, but kissed she was, 
 and her father laughed and rubbed his hands to 
 gether ; she thought he looked older than ever as he 
 sat by the side of this bronzed, eager young man. 
 
 " Why, when did you get in ? " she asked the 
 sailor. And he told his story again, that the ship 
 had reached New York only the day before, and he 
 
32 THE MATE OF THE DAYLIGHT. 
 
 wished to come home to surprise them, and so had 
 sent no message. 
 
 u He is going back early in the morning," said the 
 captain. " He tells us lie has been made master of 
 the ship ; " and if young Lewis had been the old 
 man s only son he could not have looked happier or 
 prouder ; while Susan tossed her head a little, as if 
 she were not surprised, and had always been sure of 
 this triumph from the beginning. 
 
 It proved that the captain of the Daylight had 
 been washed overboard in a gale the third day out, 
 and the first mate had been ill during the homeward 
 
 o 
 
 voyage, and had been forced to give up his position 
 altogether. So Susan s lover had brought the ship 
 across, and had handled her well, too. He had 
 taken the first mate s duties for several weeks be 
 fore they had reached Bristol, and had won great re 
 spect for his knowledge of seamanship : this and his 
 relationship to one of the owners had secured him 
 the position of captain. More than this, he had car 
 ried away some money which his mother had given 
 him from her little hoard, and he had traded with it, 
 and brought her home more than three hundred dol 
 lars, while he had something of his own beside his 
 pay, in his pocket. The elder captain was ready to 
 hear of his future projects, and a more cheerful com 
 pany never sat down to drink tea together. 
 
THE MATE OF THE DAYLIGHT. 33 
 
 The first Sunday he spent at home, he and Susan 
 walked up the broad aisle of the church side by side 
 to Captain Ryder s pew, and she wore triumphantly 
 a wide red India scarf folded about her shoulders. 
 And on week days she was proud to show the young 
 women of her acquaintance other timely gifts from 
 her handsome and promising lover. So the mate of 
 the Daylight returned to his unbelieving friends a 
 shipmaster, and when he sailed on his next voyage, 
 having gained the owners permission to carry her, 
 he had his wife for company. 
 
 But old Captain Jabez, who had been made to 
 hear all these things with difficulty, on account of his 
 increasing deafness, grumbled out one day, as he sat 
 on one of the wharves in the sunshine, like an old 
 fly who had just crawled out of a crack in the spring, 
 " It s the next v y ge that 11 show what stuff he s 
 made of. You might say this was his luck, but the 
 next 11 have to be his earning. There s plenty of 
 able shipmasters, lying idle, I should think they d 
 ha took afore they did him. But I wish Dan well, 
 so I do. I m one that likes to see young folks pros 
 per and have their day. I ve had mine ! " 
 
 
A LANDLESS FARMER. 
 
 IT was late in a lovely day of early spring, the first 
 warm Sunday of the year, when people who had been 
 housed all winter came out to church, looking pale, 
 and as if they had been hidden or lost for months. 
 It seemed as if winter, the stern old king, had sud 
 denly died, and as if the successor to the throne 
 were a tender-hearted young princess, and every 
 body felt a cheerful sense of comparative liberty and 
 freedom. The frogs were lifting up their voices 
 in all the swamps, having discovered all at once that 
 they were thawed out, and that it was time to assert 
 themselves. A faint tinge of greenness suddenly ap 
 peared on the much-abused and weather-beaten grass 
 by the roadsides, and the willows were covered with 
 a mist of greenish gold. The air was fragrant, and 
 so warm that it was almost summer-like ; but the 
 elderly people shook their heads, as they greeted 
 
A LANDLESS FARMER. 35 
 
 each other gravely in the meeting-house yard, and 
 said it was fine weather overhead, or perhaps spoke of 
 the day reproachfully as a weather-breeder. There 
 seemed to be a general dislike to giving unqualified 
 praise to this Sunday weather, which was sure to be 
 like one of the sweet spring flowers that surprise us 
 because they bloom so early, and grieve us because 
 they are so quick to fade. 
 
 After church was over in the afternoon, two or 
 three men were spending an idle hour on a little 
 bridge where the main highway of Wyland crossed 
 Cranberry Brook ; a small stream enough in summer, 
 when it could only provide water sufficient for the re 
 freshment of an occasional horse or dog belonging 
 to some stray traveler. It was apt to dry up alto 
 gether just when it was needed most ; but now the 
 swamp which it drained was running over with water, 
 and sent down a miniature flood, that bit at the banks 
 and clutched at the roots and tufts of rushes as if it 
 wished to hold itself back. It had piled already a 
 barricade of leaves and sticks and yellow foam 
 against the feeble fence that crossed it at the road 
 side, and the posts, which were almost rotted away, 
 were leaning over and working to and fro, as if they 
 had hard work to stand the strain, and might fall 
 with a great splash and go down stream with the 
 
36 A LANDLESS FARMER. 
 
 mossy rails and the sticks and yellow foam any min 
 ute. 
 
 The water had risen to within a short distance of 
 the floor of the bridge, and the three men stood 
 watching it with great interest. Two of them, who 
 had come from church, had found the other standing 
 there. He owned the pasture through which the 
 brook ran on its way to the river ; but on that side 
 of the road the ground fell off, so there was a small 
 cascade ; and his own stone walls, which stopped at 
 the edge of this, were in no danger. He wore his 
 e very-day clothes, but the other men were in their 
 Sunday best. 
 
 " Warm for the time o year, ain t it ? " asked one 
 of these, taking off his hat, and giving his forehead a 
 rub with his coat sleeve. " I wore my overcoat that 
 I have been wearing this winter to meeting this morn 
 ing, and the heft of it was more than a load of hay. 
 I come off without it this afternoon. The folks said 
 I should get my death o cold, and I do know but 
 they was right, but I wa n t going to swelter as I did 
 in the forenoon for nobody." 
 
 " Tis warm," said Ezra Allen, who was without 
 his own waistcoat, and who whittled a deliciously 
 smooth and soft bit of pine with a keen-edged knife, 
 in ideal Yankee fashion. " I ve been looking to see 
 
A LANDLESS FARMER. 37 
 
 that old fence of Uncle Jenkins s topple over; the 
 stream s most as high as I ever see it. I should n t 
 wonder if it come over the bridge, if this weather 
 holds." 
 
 u Crambry Brook s b en over this bridge more 
 times u you ve got fingers and toes, Ezra," said the 
 third man, scornfully. " Guess you ve forgot. When 
 I was a boy, t was customary for it to go over the 
 bridge every spring, and I do know but I ve seen it 
 in the fall rains as well. Parker Jenkins come near 
 getting drowned here once, you know." 
 
 " You re thinking of the little old bridge that used 
 to be over it when we was boys ; t was two or three 
 foot lower than this. The road used to be all under 
 water in them days ; I know that well as anybody. 
 I was n t referring to tho bridge. I said the brook 
 was high as I ever see it. Ef you had that little 
 bridge that was here before they h isted up the road, 
 I guess you d find it well wet down." 
 
 " Don t seem to me as if the brooks run so high as 
 they used," suggested Henry Wallis, mildly. " They 
 say it s because the country s been stripped of its 
 growth so. Cutting the pines all off lets the sun get 
 to the springs, and the ground dries right up. I 
 can t say I understand it myself, but they ve got an 
 argument for everything nowadays." 
 
38 A LANDLESS FARMER. 
 
 " There ain t so much snow as there used to be 
 when we was boys," said Ezra Allen. " I never see 
 no such drifts anywhere about as used to be round 
 the old school-house ; we used to make caves in em 
 that you could stand right up in, and have lots o 
 clear room overhead, too." 
 
 " You re considerable taller than you was in them 
 days, Ezry," said Asa Parsons. " That makes some 
 difference ; " and the three neighbors laughed to 
 gether, as if it were a great joke. 
 
 All through the parish were little groups of people 
 like this, gossiping together on their unfrequented 
 front steps, or before the barn doors, where happy 
 fowls fluffed their feathers and scratched the wet 
 ground, or quawked and strutted to and fro. There 
 was a good deal of social visiting going on, and as 
 the three men stood together on the bridge, which 
 was a favorite abiding place in summer, being not far 
 from several farmhouses, they spoke to one neighbor 
 after another, as he or she went along in the mud 
 diest possible wagons. As for the horses, they were 
 steaming as if they had come from the races, and 
 looked as if they wished, like their masters, to be re 
 lieved of their winter coats. 
 
 " Seems to me everybody was out to-day," said 
 Ezra Allen, who was a rosy-faced, pleasant-looking 
 
A LANDLESS. FARMER. 39 
 
 man of about forty. " I do know when I ve missed 
 a Sunday before ; " and he went on clipping little 
 white chips from his stick, which was dwindling away 
 slowly. 
 
 The other men waited for a few moments, until 
 they became certain that he would say no more of 
 his own accord ; and then Asa Parsons boldly in 
 quired what had kept him at home from meeting, 
 and was told that he had watched the night before 
 with old Mr. Jerry Jenkins. 
 
 " I want to know if you did," said Wallis, with 
 much concern. " I d no idea that he was so bad off 
 as to have watchers. And I should think his own 
 folks might take care of him amongst themselves. 
 He ain t been sick enough to tucker them out, seems 
 to me." 
 
 " I guess I m as near to being his own folks as 
 anybody, if setting by him counts for anything," said 
 Ezra, with a good deal of feeling. " I always 
 thought everything of Uncle Jerry. He s done me 
 more kind turns than anybody else ever did, and he s 
 a good-hearted man, if ever there was one. He s 
 none of your sharpers, but he s got the good will of 
 everybody that knows him, less it s his own chil 
 dren." 
 
 The three friends were leaning against the rail 
 
40 A LANDLESS FARMER. 
 
 of the bridge, all in a row. Ezra whittled fiercely 
 for a minute ; the hands of his companions were 
 plunged deep into their already sagging pockets. 
 They looked at him eagerly, for they knew instinct 
 ively that he was going to say something more. He 
 shut his jack-knife with a loud snap, and turned and 
 threw the bit of white pine into the noisy, rushing 
 brook. It was only a second before it had gone un 
 der the bridge, to show itself white and light on the 
 brown water, and lift itself as if for a leap on the 
 rounded edge of the little fall, and disappear. Ezra s 
 forced discretion seemed to have been thrown away 
 with it. 
 
 " Sereny Nudd found out, somehow or nother, be 
 fore I come away this morning, that I mistrusted 
 about things, and she come meachin round, wanting 
 me not to tell ; but all I told her was that I would n t 
 have done it, if I was her, if I was going to be 
 ashamed of it. I don t know when anything has 
 riled me up so. Says I, right to her face and eyes, 
 I m mortified to death to think I am any relation to 
 such folks as you be, and she shut the door right in 
 my face, and I cleared out. I ve been sorry all day 
 I said it ; not on account of her, but now she s mad 
 she won t let me go near the old gentleman, if she 
 can help it, and I might have looked after him a 
 good deal." 
 
A LANDLESS "-FARMER. 41 
 
 " What s to pay ? " asked Wallis and Parsons, 
 eagerly ; it was some time since anything had hap 
 pened to them which promised to be of so much in 
 terest as this. Ezra Allen was not easily excited, 
 and was an uncommonly peaceable man under ordi 
 nary circumstances. 
 
 " Well, if I must say it, they ve prevailed upon 
 that poor old man to sign away his property, and I 
 call it a burning shame." 
 
 " How long ago ? " and the hearers looked at Ezra 
 with startled countenances. Yet there could be seen 
 a flicker of satisfaction at this beginning of his story. 
 
 " Some time in the winter," answered Ezra. " The 
 poor creatur has been laid up, you know, a good 
 deal of the time, and there come a day when he was 
 summoned to probate court, on account of that trust 
 money he s got for the Foxwell child n. You know 
 he s guardeen for em, and it s been a sight o trouble 
 to him. He might have sent word to the judge that 
 he wa n t able to come and see to it, and t would ha 
 done just as well three months hence, being a form of 
 law he had to go through ; but what does them plants 
 o grace do but work him all up, and tell him a lot o 
 stuff an nonsense, until he was ready to do whatever 
 they said. He put the power into Aaron Nudd s 
 hands to go over and tend to the Foxwell matter ; 
 
42 A LANDLESS FARMER. 
 
 and then they went at him again (he told me all about 
 it in the night, though I have had an inkling of it 
 for some time past), and they told him t wa n t likely 
 he d ever get about again, and he was too old to look 
 after business, and go hither and yon about the coun 
 try. All he wanted was his liviri , they told him, 
 and he d better give them the care of things and save 
 himself all he could, and make himself comfortable 
 the rest of his days. Sereny Nudd is dreadful fair- 
 spoken when she gives her mind to it, and uncle, 
 he s somehow or nother always had a great respect 
 for her judgment, and been kind of fraid of her into 
 the bargain ; and he was sick and weak, and they 
 bothered him about to death, till he signed off at last, 
 just to get a little peace. Mary Lyddy Bryan was 
 there at the time, a mournin and complaining same 
 as she always is. Sereny won t have her about, gen 
 erally, but she got her to help then, and between 
 em they won him over. Mary Lyddy is always a 
 dwellin on being left a widow with no means, and a 
 little family to fetch up, and her father s always had 
 to help her. Both of her boys is big enough to be 
 doing for themselves, and ought to be put on to 
 farms, or to some trades ; but they 11 never do a stroke 
 of work if they can help it." 
 
 " Did they draw up the papers just as they wanted 
 
A LANDLESS ^FARMER. 43 
 
 ? em, and make the old sir sign em ? " asked Parsons. 
 " I should n t ha* thought he d been fool enough." 
 
 " Nor I, neither," replied Ezra, who was in the 
 flood tide of successful narration ; " but we know, all 
 of us, that their father ain t what he used to be, and 
 he was a sick man at the time. They put it to him 
 this way : that he would have everything he wanted, 
 same s if t was his own, and that he should have 
 his say about everything just the same, t was only 
 to save him trouble of the care of things, and the 
 way Sereny fixed it was abominable. She got him, 
 first of all, to give Mary Lyddy her place to Harlow s 
 Mills, where she lives, out and out, because, says 
 she, it may smarten up the boys, and give them 
 some ambition, if they feel it s their own. Mary 
 Lyddy always was kind of wanting, and she never 
 see through it that Sereny was getting double what 
 she was, she was so pleased about getting her place 
 in her own right. Uncle, he told me he did n t want 
 to do anything about the bank stock, and, to tell the 
 truth, he always meant the farm for Parker; but the 
 girls set to so about him that there wa n t no use. 
 Sereny said if ever her father wanted to change his 
 mind he could do it, and make out new papers." 
 
 " After he d gone and give it to her, it wa n t his 
 to give," growled Asa Parsons. " Did n t he know 
 that ? " 
 
44 A LANDLESS FARMER. 
 
 " Well, I can tell you he s been sick ever since he 
 realized what he d done," said Ezra. " He said last 
 night that it had been gnawing at his conscience that 
 it wa n t fair to Parker or to Mary Lyddy, neither. 
 I stuck up for Parker, but I told him Mary Lyddy 
 would n t be any better off if she had a million ; and 
 Sereny wa n t far from the truth when she said he d 
 always been doing for her. But as for Parker, he d 
 done well enough if he had n t been nagged to death. 
 I know he drank more n was good for him, and hated 
 farm work ; but there was sights o good things about 
 him, and he wa n t no common fool. They Ve dinned 
 it into the old man s ears that he must be dead, they 
 ain t heard from him for so long ; but Sereny never 
 would write to him, and the old man s eyesight s 
 failed him of late. He cried like a child as he lay 
 there in bed, last night. He got hold of my hand 
 and gripped it, arid said he did n t know, till he got 
 Mary Lyddy to read him the paper all through, once 
 when Sereny was out to a neighbor s, that they d 
 worded it so s to leave Parker out. It gives Mary 
 Lyddy her place, and a piece of woodland beside, 
 that comes from her mother s folks ; and everything 
 else this farm, and the bank stock and everything 
 to Sereny. She s got as much as three thousand 
 dollars more than her half, grasping creatur s both 
 
A LANDLESS^FARMER. 45 
 
 on em, she and Aaron Nudd is, and they ve got a 
 young one that s going to be worse n either of em. 
 I thought last night that the sooner poor old uncle 
 was laid away, down in the burying-ground, the bet 
 ter t would be for him. Like s not they 11 never 
 trouble themselves to set up a stone for him ; but I 11 
 see to it myself, sure as the world, if they don t show 
 him respect, taking away his rights, kind as he s 
 always been, and a good neighbor. His only fault 
 has been that he was too lavish. There ain t much 
 the matter with him that I can see, except he s dis 
 tressed, and seemed to feel he was broke in his mind, 
 and there was nothing to look forward to. They ve 
 moved him out of the room where he always slept 
 into a back bed -room, where there ain t room to 
 swing a cat, and no chance for a fire. I like to have 
 froze to death. I set up in my overcoat all night, for 
 t was chillier than you d suppose before such a mild 
 day. He wa n t warm enough along towards morn 
 ing, and I scouted round till I got some blankets, 
 for there was n t nothing over him but old quilted 
 spreads. Sereny come in in the morning, mad as 
 fire any way, because it seems she heard us talking 
 in the night ; but when she see them blankets, she 
 like to have died, and asked why I did n t come to 
 her if I wanted more bedclothe* t was too bad to 
 
46 A LANDLESS FARMER. 
 
 spill medicines all over the best she had. * There 
 ain t a spot on em, nor a brack in em, said I, real 
 pleasant, though I could ha bit her head off. I 
 remember I was with your mother when she bought 
 em ; t was one of the last times she was ever over 
 to the mills. I happened to be into Harlow s shop 
 when she was selecting them, she got them very 
 cheap. I told our folks what a bargain they was for 
 the quality ; not that I pretend to be a judge of such 
 things, but the women thought they did n t need them. 
 I just spoke of it to Sereny, so she d see I knew 
 they were none of her buying ; and I said, right be 
 fore her, The best ain t too good for you, uncle. " 
 
 u Well," said Henry Wallis, prudently, " I never 
 thought I should like to take up with Sereny Nudd, 
 for better for worse ; but she may do well by her 
 father, after all. Old folks has been known to be dif 
 ficult, but she ain t done right so far as we can see." 
 
 " Done right ! " exclaimed Asa Parsons. " It s a 
 burning shame, and J hope she 11 be met with. 
 That s what was going on one day last winter, when 
 1 saw that sneaking Josh Hayden riding home with 
 Aaron Nudd. He s a lawyer, what there is of 
 him, and I suppose they got him over to do the 
 business. I heard he d deeded Mary Lyddy her 
 place." 
 
A LANDLESS ^FARMER. 47 
 
 " I don t want to think of it," said Ezra, disgust 
 edly, " but it follows me about the whole time. I 
 suppose I could have got out to meeting to-day, but 
 it would have been more than I could stand to see 
 Nudd and Sereny parade up the broad aisle. I wa n t 
 so beat out that I could n t have gone ; one night s 
 watching won t use me up ! " 
 
 The friends now separated, for the air was growing 
 cold and damp. Asa Parsons mentioned that his 
 overcoat would n t do him any harm if he had it then, 
 and he and Wallis went away together, while Ezra 
 turned toward the other direction. 
 
 " Suppose you 11 be out to town-meeting," Wallis 
 called after him. It was fairly amazing that nobody 
 should have spoken about the great day, anticipa 
 tions of which were in every man s mind, to a greater 
 or less degree. Ezra Allen had not been without his 
 hopes of running for selectman, to tell the truth, 
 he had looked forward all the week before to fur 
 thering his cause among his neighbors by a friendly 
 word in season on Sunday ; but his uncle s wrongs 
 had driven his own political interests quite out of his 
 head. He walked slowly home in the fast-gather 
 ing spring chilliness, the noise of the brook growing 
 fainter and fainter. He suffered a slight reaction 
 from his enthusiasm, and wished he had not spoken 
 
48 A LANDLESS FARMER. 
 
 so warmly against his cousins. " Mary Lyddy s a 
 poor dragging creatur , he said to himself ; " and as 
 for Sereny, she s near, and set in her own way, but 
 she may treat the old .gentleman well, for shame s 
 sake. I don t know but I was hasty, but I don t care 
 if I was ; it wa n t the right thing for her to do ; and 
 then, there s Parker." By way of balancing any 
 harm he might have done, he held his peace in his 
 own household, and refrained from beguiling the tedi- 
 ousness of a Sunday evening by introducing this most 
 interesting subject of conversation. He had a way 
 of keeping things to himself at times, which his wife 
 found most provoking ; but he was possessed of that 
 uncharacteristic trait of many reticent people, of tell 
 ing his secrets generously and even recklessly, if he 
 once was forced to break through the first barrier of 
 reserve. 
 
 The next morning was clear and not cold, but the 
 warmth and revivifying influence of the day before 
 was not to be felt. It was commonplace New Eng 
 land spring weather, and had a relationship to the 
 melting of snow and the lingering of winter which 
 was most unconsoling. A large number of persons 
 had taken violent colds, and the frogs preserved a dis 
 creet silence. Asa Parsons wore not only his over 
 coat to town-meeting, but a woolen comforter round 
 
A LANDLESS FARMER. 49 
 
 his throat as well ; and he sneezed from time to time, 
 angrily, as if it were a note of disapproval and con 
 tempt. There was a grand quarrel over the laying 
 out of a new piece of road, and it was at first found 
 very difficult to choose the town officers. There was 
 a monotonous repetition of polling the house, and 
 when Ezra Allen lost, at last, the coveted position of 
 selectman, he had become so angry with some of his 
 opponents, and so tired with the noisy war, that the 
 glory of the occasion was very much tarnished. It 
 was over at four o clock, and nobody had had any 
 dinner, except a slight refreshment of wilted russet 
 apples and very watery and sour cider, which could 
 be bought at abominable prices over the tailboard of 
 one of the wagons which were fastened in long rows 
 to the fences near the old meeting-house, which had 
 been given over to governmental purposes. 
 
 Aaron Nudd was by no means a favorite among 
 his townsfolk. He was very stingy, and had saved 
 considerable money, for which it was supposed Se 
 rena Jenkins had married him. He was of the oppo 
 site party in politics to Ezra Allen, and he had been 
 the opposing and successful candidate for the office 
 which Ezra had lost. Aaron s wagon was next but 
 one, and the two men unfastened their horses sulkily, 
 without looking at each other. Ezra went home pre- 
 4 
 
50 A LANDLESS FARMER. 
 
 pared to believe any report of cruelty or injustice on 
 the part of his uncle s children, and full of the inten 
 tion to tell the story of their trickery in his own 
 household. But he was not even to have this pleas 
 ure on that unlucky day. His wife asked him re 
 proachfully, as he entered, why he had said nothing 
 of what everybody had been talking about who went 
 by the house, and which would have been no story at 
 all without his own report (already much magnified) 
 of the meanness and knavery of Serena Nudd. 
 
 The next morning Ezra resumed his business of 
 wheelwright, from which he had taken a two days 
 vacation ; but the excitement had been a good deal 
 of a strain upon him, and he worked without much 
 enthusiasm for a few hours, and about eleven o clock 
 laid down his tools altogether. The spoke-shave was 
 so dull that it needed grinding, and there was nobody 
 to turn the grindstone, and his head ached a little. 
 He did not feel inclined to start out upon a new piece 
 of work, and, taking a disgusted look around the shop 
 at the disjointed limbs of various old and new vehicles, 
 he threw off his apron, and went to the house, which 
 was only a few rods distant along the road. Outside 
 the shop door were stacked some dozens of wheels 
 in various stages of decay and decrepitude, and two 
 or three old wagon-bodies and chaise-tops were rest- 
 
A LANDLESS FARMER. 51 
 
 ing on the ground in most forlorn condition, as if 
 they had been relentlessly exposed to all the winter 
 weather. The wood-work of one new farm cart was 
 set up on trestles, and had received its first coat of 
 paint ; but that was the only sign of any progress of 
 the art that was carried on within. One would think, 
 from the outward appearance of a wheelwright s shop, 
 that it was also a repository of worn-out carriages of 
 every description. The trade is apparently never 
 carried on without much useless rubbish, unless one 
 may venture the suggestion that it is necessary to 
 have a collection of specimens showing the advances 
 and effects of various diseases of wheels, as surgeons 
 are furnished forth with anatomical cabinets. On the 
 seat of an old wagon there was perched a large rag 
 doll, and when Ezra saw it he smiled, for the first 
 time that morning. He was very fond of his little 
 girl, to whom the doll belonged. 
 
 He pushed open the kitchen door with some faint 
 thrills of pleasure, for a great whiff of a well-known 
 odor blew out through the half-opened window which 
 he had just passed. His wife was frying doughnuts, 
 and he did not notice at first, for the smoke and 
 steam obscured the atmosphere, that some one was 
 sitting at the other side of the room. 
 
 "Just in time, ain t I?" said Ezra, cheerfully; 
 
52 A LANDLESS FARMER. 
 
 then, to his great disgust and confusion, he saw that 
 the guest was his cousin. " Is that you, Sereny ? " 
 he asked, in quite another tone. 
 
 " Yes, it is," said Mrs. Nudd, snappishly, " and I 
 should think you "d be ashamed to look me in the 
 face, Ezra Allen. You Ve been and done the best 
 you could to take away my good name, and I don t 
 see what harm I ever done you nor yours ; " and she 
 began to cry in a most obnoxious fashion. 
 
 Ezra gave himself an angry twitch and went over 
 to the window, where he stood with his back to the 
 company, and looked longingly at the safe harbor of 
 the shop which he had just left. His wife, who was 
 a fearful soul and who hated a quarrel, escaped with 
 her colander full of doughnuts to the recesses of the 
 pantry, from whence she stole a glance now and 
 then at the others, like a distressed mouse which had 
 doubts about venturing out of its hole. Mrs. Nudd 
 sniffed and sobbed, and wiped her not very wet eyes 
 with her handkerchief again and again ; but still 
 Ezra did not speak, and nothing could be more ag 
 gravating. 
 
 " Enoch Foster said, this morning," she remarked, 
 in a broken voice, " that he supposed you was put 
 out about the election, and Aaron s getting in ahead 
 of you. But I wa n t going to hear my own first 
 
A LANDLESS FARMER. 53 
 
 cousin spoken of no such way, and I said that you 
 hadn t nothing to do with it; you was too straightfor - 
 ard a man. I knew you was hasty to speak, but there 
 never was nothing mean about you, with all your 
 faults ; and I explained it as best I could, for I m 
 sure I don t know no other reason. Poor old father s 
 mind is broke more than folks think who conies in 
 and sees him for a visit ; and he s got set upon our 
 having got away his property from him. T was all his 
 own set-out to deed it to us now in his life-time. He 
 got kind of worried and confused a spell ago, and 
 seemed to want to be rid of the care of it; and we 
 made the change to gratify him. Aaron said he 
 would n t have no such goings-on, and that he did n t 
 want the farm nohow. He s been desiring for a long 
 spell to move to Harlow s Mills and go into the shoe 
 factory ; he could have had a first-rate chance any 
 time in the boxing room, but we seemed to be pinned 
 right down where we was, on father s account." 
 
 O 
 
 " You need n t have drove off Parker, then," 
 grumbled Ezra; but though Mrs. Allen heard him 
 in the pantry, and shook for fear, Mrs. Nudd went 
 on complacently : 
 
 " I m sure we ve always done the best we could 
 by our folks, and by the neighbors. We ain t had 
 the means to be free-handed, for we never knew what 
 
54 A LANDLESS FARMER. 
 
 was our own and what was n t. One day father d 
 be real arbitrary, and gather up whatever there 
 was, even the butter money, that anybody d think I 
 might have a right to ; and next thing, he would n t 
 want to be consulted about anything. Aaron went 
 to him one day about a bunch o laths, when he was 
 going to alter the hen-coop, and father give it to him 
 right an left, because he bothered him about it. He 
 refused him the money, and said Aaron had made 
 enough off from the place, and he should think lie 
 might attend to a job of that size himself." 
 
 Ezra gave a sympathetic chuckle, and his cousin 
 wished she had left out this illustration. " I only 
 spoke of it because some days father would have 
 grieved hisself to death if he had n t been told some 
 thing that was half the importance," she explained, 
 in a higher key than ever. "If you had to summer 
 and winter him I guess you d find out. He ain t so 
 easy-going and pleasant as folks seem to think. I 
 know it ain t right to talk so about my own father, 
 that s failed from what he used to be, but I Ve got 
 to stand up for myself, if my own relations won t 
 stand up for me ; " and at this point she cried again, 
 more sorrowfully than before. " I do have a hard 
 time," she said, in conclusion : " father to please ; and 
 Mary Lyddy a-dwellin on her trials, and tellin her 
 
A LANDLESS &ARMER. 55 
 
 complaints, and waritiii to borrow everything I ve 
 got ; and Aaron a-fussin and discontented, and talk 
 ing about going West ; and Parker, he spent about 
 all the ready money he could tease out of father. I 
 wonder the place ain t all mortgaged, and I dare say 
 we shall find it is. Some days, I wish I was laid in 
 my grave, for I sha n t get no rest this side of it." 
 
 Ezra s wife, in" the pantry, was ready to cry, also, 
 by the time she heard the end of this touching appeal, 
 and she did not see how her husband could be so 
 stony-hearted. She wished he -would say something, 
 and knocked two pans together for a signal, and then 
 was dreadfully shocked by what she had done. She 
 was not very fond of Serena Nudd, and could talk 
 angrily about her, behind her back, at any time ; but 
 beinsr a weak little soul, and anxious to avoid con- 
 
 o 
 
 tention, when there was any danger of getting a blow 
 herself, she was ready, being also a woman, to take 
 her complaining visitor s part. 
 
 But Ezra shifted his weight from one foot to the 
 
 o 
 
 other, and fumbled a button which was at the back 
 of his collar, and which, at that opportune moment, 
 came off and dropped on the floor. " I guess you 11 
 have to set a stitch in this, if you will, Susan," he 
 said, with well-feigned indifference ; and Susan came 
 obediently out from among the pots and pans, very 
 
56 A LANDLESS FARMER. 
 
 shamefaced and meek. The button had rolled almost 
 to Mrs. Nudd s feet, and when Ezra looked for it un 
 successfully, she stooped and picked it up, and handed 
 it to his wife with a heavy sigh, and then rose to take 
 leave. 
 
 "I shall be ready any time to watch with the old 
 gentleman, if he needs it, or even thinks he does," 
 remarked Ezra, as if he had heard nothing of what 
 his cousin Serena had said ; and she did not know 
 how to answer him, though usually she was equal to 
 the occasion. She went away in doubt whether she 
 had won a great victory, or had been defeated ; and 
 she took the plate of doughnuts which Susan humbly 
 offered in the old gentleman s behalf, hardly knowing 
 what it was, she felt so unlike herself, all of a sudden. 
 But she " came to " before she was out of sight of the 
 house, and though she hated Ezra worse than ever, 
 she ate one of the doughnuts with uncommon relish, 
 and put another in her pocket. 
 
 The spring days lengthened and grew into sum 
 mer, and the excitement which attended the knowl 
 edge of the transfer of old Mr. Jenkins s property 
 died slowly away. He looked so wilted and changed 
 by his illness of the winter that it was by no means 
 difficult for the town s-people to believe that his mind 
 had become as much enfeebled as his body. As for 
 
A LANDLESS-FARMER. 57 
 
 his nearest neighbors, they saw him rarely, for he 
 was too lame to make the short journey to their 
 houses ; and in the early summer business of the 
 farms nobody found much time to go visiting Serena 
 Nudd or her most unpopular husband. He was a 
 sly looking, faded-out little man, of no attractions, 
 and a sneaking manner which disgusted the persons 
 he sought most eagerly to please. It had been 
 thought that he would favor some projects about the 
 new road, which he frowned upon directly he was in 
 office ; and that angered the parties who were most 
 concerned, and there grew steadily a feeling of shame 
 and regret that he should have won so easily his 
 prominent position in town affairs. He paid the 
 taxes on the farm with unusual promptness, and the 
 treasurer took notice that he had crossed out Mr. 
 Jenkins s name from the tax-bill and inserted his own 
 in its place. There was a good deal of sympathy 
 felt for the old man, because he had not deserved 
 such a miserable son-in-law. People hoped that he 
 was treated well, but it was taken for granted, in 
 those few weeks, that the poor old farmer was fast 
 breaking up, and, under the circumstances, nobody 
 could wish him to live long, since it would only in 
 volve the greater discomforts of old age, and a con 
 tinued suffering of one sort and another. As for his 
 
58 A LANDLESS FARMER. 
 
 daughter Serena, she was making great bids for 
 friendship, and was showing herself both generous 
 and neighborly, in a way that much surprised her 
 acquaintances. She spoke with great concern of her 
 father s failing health, and some persons began to say 
 she was good-hearted, and what a pity it was that she 
 should have thrown herself away on such a man as 
 Aaron Nudd. She drove old Mr. Jenkins to church 
 one hot Sunday, when Aaron was reported to be 
 kept at home by the expected swarming from a hive 
 of bees ; and it was certainly very kind, the way in 
 which she helped him down out of the high wagon, 
 and along the broad aisle to his pew. He looked 
 round the church as pleased as a child, and seemed 
 to enjoy the unusual opportunity of being among his 
 friends and neighbors. The older people watched 
 him affectionately, he was younger than several 
 who were there, and many of the younger mem 
 bers of the congregation expected him to betray in 
 some way his shattered wits. But he seemed to be 
 in full possession of his faculties as far as any one 
 could decide at that time ; and when Serena ostenta 
 tiously found his place in a hymn-book, and offered 
 it to him, he shook his head at her in great perplex 
 ity, and proceeded to search for the right page in his 
 own copy of Watts and Select Hymns, which was 
 
A LANDLESS EslRMER. 59 
 
 of large type, and for years had been ready to his 
 hand in the corner of the pew. u I m all right, if it 
 was n t for my lameness," he told a half dozen of the 
 friends who crowded about him. " I can get about a 
 good deal better than the folks think I can, too ; but 
 Sereny keeps right after me," he added, in a lower 
 voice to Ezra Allen, who had been more pleased than 
 anybody to see his uncle in his accustomed seat, and 
 who indulged a hope that now he was about again he 
 would take things into his own hands. But the poor 
 man stumbled on the meeting-house steps that very 
 Sunday, and gave himself a bad strain, and passed 
 many a long and lonely day afterward in his dark, 
 close bedroom, in that summer weather. Out-of- 
 doors the birds sang, and the grass grew and grew, 
 until it waved in the wind and was furrowed like the 
 sea. The old farmer worried and fretted about the 
 crops, and could not imagine how the fields got on 
 without his oversight and care. He was always call 
 ing Aaron, or the man who had been engaged to help 
 him, and demanding strict account of the potatoes 
 and corn and beans. He had worked day in and day 
 out on his land, until that summer, and he was sure 
 everything must be going to wreck and ruin without 
 him. Aaron evaded some of his questions, he 
 thought, and treated him like a child. If it had not 
 
60 A LANDLESS FARMER. 
 
 been for his lameness, he would have risen in wrath 
 from his bed, and have dispersed the whole family 
 like marauding chickens. Even Ezra Allen was not 
 attentive, and this was hard to understand, though 
 the frequent breaking of farm tools and the wear and 
 tear of the vehicles of the town gave him more than 
 enough to do, while he had his own farming to look 
 after beside. 
 
 Serena grew less and less amiable, but she was what 
 she and her neighbors called a regular driver, and 
 she had a hard fight to get through with her every 
 day work. If her father demanded a long explana 
 tion of the reasons that had led to the selling of a 
 cow, she was by no means ready to satisfy him, and 
 to stop in the midst of everything to answer his rest 
 less, eager questions by quieting accounts of the cir 
 cumstances ; and as for the man who had come sev 
 eral times to make the bargain, he was kept out of 
 the old farmer s hearing altogether. At last, in a 
 desperate moment, Mr. Jenkins, like a distressed 
 New England Lear, said that as soon as he was well 
 enough he should go to stay for a while with his 
 other daughter ; for Mary Lyddy was always civil 
 spoken to him, and was always pleased to see him, 
 if other people were not. "It will be a first-rate 
 thing to get rid of him through haying," Serena 
 
A LANDLESS FARMER. 61 
 
 told her lord and master that night. " I m thankful 
 it was his own proposal ; " and then they talked over 
 the question of her father s prompt removal to an 
 other scene of uselessness. 
 
 The next morning but one, Serena put her head 
 inside the old man s door, and said she guessed he 
 had better get out into the fresh air that day. Aaron 
 was coming right in to help him. This was good 
 news, for Mr. Jenkins had urged his daughter to be 
 lieve that there was no need of his lying in bed any 
 longer, while she had insisted that she was following 
 the doctor s orders, and that if he stirred before the 
 proper time he would only bring fresh disasters upon 
 himself and his family. He found himself weak and 
 stiff when he tried to move about, but such was his 
 delight at being again his own master that he soon 
 felt uncommonly strong and energetic, and sat down 
 at the breakfast-table in the kitchen with a look of 
 proud satisfaction. 
 
 " I m going to be in first-rate trim for haying," he 
 announced gravely. Aaron had swallowed his break 
 fast as nearly whole as possible, and had departed ; 
 and Serena was already clattering at the dishes. 
 
 " This is prime corn-cake," said the farmer. " I 
 declare, Sereny, it tastes like it used to, just like 
 what your mother used to make." 
 
62 A LANDLESS FARMER. 
 
 " It always tastes alike to me," responded Mrs. 
 Nudd, in a not unkindly tone. " You re getting to 
 be notional." Serena was not celebrated for her 
 skill in cookery, and this compliment had touched her 
 tenderly. 
 
 " Ain t it a good while since we have had a nice 
 
 o 
 
 cabbage ? " asked Mr. Jenkins, presently. " I sup 
 pose, though, they re about gone. I declare, how 
 the weeks fly by ! It don t seem but a fortnight 
 since we were getting em in, in the fall of the year." 
 
 " For mercy sake ! " said Serena. " I believe you 
 are losing your faculties ! The idea of cabbages 
 keeping through haying ! You might as well wish 
 for some of the Thanksgiving pies. There ! I do 
 the best I can to suit you, but it s hard for one pair 
 o hands to do everything. I did expect to have help 
 in haying time, but Aaron says he can t afford it, 
 now he s got the whole farm to lug." 
 
 " He s got the whole farm to help him, at any 
 rate," said Mr. Jenkins, blazing up into something 
 like his youthful spirit. " He was always crying 
 poor, and wheedling round, and you was, too, till you 
 got the farm, and now you re worse off than you 
 was before. I ve always made an honest living, and 
 stood well in the town, and I ve brought up my chil 
 dren, and kept my fences and buildings in good order. 
 
A LANDLESS FARMER. 63 
 
 I won t have such talk from you nor Aaron Nudd 
 neither." But Serena had flown, and the old man 
 might have relieved his mind by more just accusa 
 tions without causing trouble, for there was nobody 
 within hearing. The kitchen was hot, and the late 
 June light was flaring in at the windows and door ; 
 it promised to be a very hot day. Mr. Jenkins felt 
 a little tired and weak ; he wished he had not said so 
 much, and told himself again the familiar and unwel 
 come truth that he had had his day. He looked about 
 the room, which did not seem natural, for some rea 
 son or other. " Sereny ! " he suddenly shouted. 
 " What s become of my chist o drawers, my 
 desk ? My papers is all in it. I hope you have n t 
 got them into a mess ; " and he looked around him 
 again, puzzled and miserable. There was a noise of 
 the pounding and creaking caused by a rolling-pin in 
 the great pantry, and presently Serena said that he 
 used it very little, and it was considerably in the 
 way, and an old furniture dealer had come along and 
 offered a good price for it, and she had sold it. She 
 needed a new sewing-machine, and she didn t sup 
 pose he would care. She always wanted that place 
 for her sewing-machine, right between the windows, 
 where there was a good light. 
 
 " I am going to learn you that I won t be pulled 
 
64 A LANDLESS FARMER. 
 
 about by the nose in this way another day ; " and 
 Mr. Jenkins s daughter did not remember that she 
 had ever seen her father in such a rage before. " You 
 can tell Aaron to hunt up that man, and get my piece 
 o furniture back ; t was my father s before me, and 
 it has stood in this kitchen a hundred years. I don t 
 care what you want, nor what you don t want, nor 
 nothing about your sewing-machine. You just go 
 and get that secretary back, or it 11 be the worse for 
 you. I don t see as you ve any call to act as if I 
 was dead, right before my face. It s a hard thing for 
 a man o my years to see another master over his own 
 house, and live to see himself forgotten ; " and the 
 poor old creature, whose pleasure at being about the 
 house again was so cruelly spoiled, shook with anger, 
 and meant to walk out-of-door indignantly ; but his 
 strength suddenly failed, and he leaned back in his 
 chair again. Serena had nothing further to say, and 
 the knocking and rolling still continued. She was 
 making a tough company of dried-apple pies for the 
 family sustenance in the haying season. The kitchen 
 looked strangely empty without its one handsome 
 and heavy piece of furniture, whose dark wood and 
 great dull brass handles had somehow given a nobler 
 character to the room, which was the usual gathering 
 place of the family. In Serena s mother s day the 
 
A LANDLESS FARMER. 65 
 
 bat-handles had always been well polished, and had 
 many an evening reflected the brightness of the roar 
 ing great chimney-place fire. A little later in the 
 morning, the farmer asked his daughter to fetch him 
 the papers which had been kept carefully in the 
 quaint corners and pigeon-holes. She feared to dis 
 obey, and for hours the old man set drearily unfold 
 ing and poring over the small basketful of worn 
 papers which held his history and his few business 
 records. There was a curl which his wife had cut 
 from the head of their little child who had died, and 
 there was a piece of the Charter Oak at Hartford, 
 and a bit of California gold that his brother had sent 
 home in the early days of the gold-diggings stored 
 away with the rest, the old man s few treasures 
 and playthings. They were huddled together in mis 
 erable confusion, though he had always known where 
 to put his hand on each when they were in their places. 
 
 II. 
 
 SERENA S not very tender heart was somewhat 
 touched at last, and she noticed how worn and old 
 her father looked, and wished she had not sold the 
 secretary without speaking to him about it first. 
 She thought it was no time then to say what a good 
 5 
 
66 A LANDLESS FARMER. 
 
 price she had wrung out of the man who had made 
 the purchase, and at any rate her father might insist 
 upon putting the money in his own pocket. She was 
 unusually good-natured all that day, and even went 
 so far as to say that she was glad to see him about 
 the house again. She was a good deal of a coward, 
 as all tyrants and bullies are apt to be ; and she be 
 gan to be a little afraid, when her father s weakness 
 and dependency seemed to have been replaced by a 
 sullen indifference to both her words and actions 
 when she came near, and a look of wounded disap 
 proval when she left him to himself. 
 
 The next morning he said that he wanted some 
 one to go over to Mary Lyddy s with him, and bring 
 the horse home. Somehow, Serena felt a shameful 
 sense of guilt and almost of repentance, as she stood 
 in the kitchen door and watched her father drive 
 away. It seemed as if he might have started of his 
 own accord upon a journey from whence there could 
 be no return. He did not turn his head after the horse 
 had started ; he had not even said good-by. There 
 was a small trunk in the back of the wagon, an odd, 
 ancient thing, studded with many nails and covered 
 with moth-devoured leather ; one might believe it 
 had attained a great age before starting on this first 
 journey, it looked so unused to travel and so garret- 
 
A LANDLESS FARMER. 67 
 
 like. Into it, very early in the morning, Mr. Jenkins 
 had packed some of his few personal possessions, and 
 his daughter looked at it again and again with suspi 
 cious eyes. " I declare, it s a dreadful thing to get to 
 be old and past our usefulness," she said. " Who would 
 have thought that father would have turned against 
 me so, just for selling an old, out-o -fashion chist o* 
 drawers, after the way I ve tended and nursed him, 
 and mended him up and waited upon him by inches ? 
 Well, it s the way of the world ! " And after these 
 reflections, the rattling wagon and plodding horse 
 and the stern, upright figure of the aggrieved old man 
 having passed out of sight over the brow of a hill 
 which rose beyond the house, she turned back into 
 the kitchen again. " Father used to be a dreadful 
 easy-going man," she said to herself, later. " I won 
 der how long he and Mary Lyddy will hitch their 
 horses together. But I most wish I had n t let the 
 
 o 
 
 secr tary go without consulting him. I suppose 
 9 t was his right. I 11 let him stay a spell over to the 
 Mills, and he 11 be sure to get over his huff, and be 
 homesick and wore out with Mary Lyddy s ram 
 shackle ways, and I 11 go over, just s if nothing had 
 happened, and fetch him home." 
 
 Harlow s Mills was an unattractive village, which 
 had grown up suddenly, a few years before, around 
 
68 A LANDLESS FARMER. 
 
 some small manufactories. Mrs. Bryan s husband 
 had been a very successful, industrious man, and it 
 had been thought a most lucky thing for her when 
 he had fallen in love with her pretty face, without 
 waiting to see what sort of character lay behind it. 
 He had done well in his business, and kept every 
 thing straight at home as long as he had lived ; but 
 when he died of fever, at the prime of his life, he 
 had saved only a small property, and his inefficient 
 wife was left to fight her way alone. She surren 
 dered ignominiously, and had been tugged along the 
 path of life by her friends and relatives, who grudged 
 even their sympathy more and more. " When you ve 
 lugged folks one mile, you like to see em try to go 
 the next themselves, not sit right down in the 
 road," Serena Nudd had said more than once, and not 
 without reason. Poor Mary Lydia had sheltered her 
 laziness behind various chronic illnesses, which had 
 excused her from active participation in the world s 
 affairs ; though when anything was going forward 
 in which she cared, for any reason, to join, it had 
 often been noticed that she would step forward with 
 the best. A funeral had such attractions for her 
 that nothing short of her own death-bed would divert 
 her attention or keep her at home. She had vast re 
 serves of strength and will, but she passed most of 
 
A LANDLESS FARMER. 69 
 
 her time in an unstrung, complaining state. Her 
 house was forlorn, and her boys had grown used to 
 her feeble protests and appeals, and rarely took much 
 notice of what she said except to escape from the 
 whining and scolding as soon as they could. There 
 was a good deal in her life which was pitiable, but 
 still more for which one might blame her ; and it was 
 her comfortless house, with its dreary, shaded, un 
 fruitful bit of land, to which the once busy old 
 farmer had fled for refuge. The maple-trees that 
 Henry Bryan had planted had grown too luxuriantly 
 in that damp place, and the grass underneath was all 
 in coarse tufts, mixed with a rank growth of plantain 
 leaves, beside a fine nursery of young burdocks which 
 that summer had started up unheeded in a corner. 
 
 Mr. Jenkins felt more and more saddened and dis 
 turbed all the way, and the drive to the Mills seemed 
 very long and hot. He had little to say to his com 
 panion, though he sometimes commented upon the 
 different fields and pastures that skirted the roads. 
 One neighbor s potatoes and another s corn looked 
 strong and flourishing ; he took note of them with 
 wistfulness. " I m done, I m done," he said once 
 or twice, half to himself. He stopped, at last, at his 
 daughter s door, and while his companion took the 
 
70 A LANDLESS FARMER. 
 
 little trunk down from the wagon, he went in search 
 of the mistress of the house. There was a strong 
 odor of camphor in the darkened, close front room, 
 and a voice asked feebly who was there. 
 
 " I ve come to stop with you for a spell," answered 
 the old man. " I have been laid up, and not good for 
 much of anything ; and Sereny, she carried too many 
 guns for me, and I thought perhaps you might like 
 to have comp ny." There was a pathetic attempt at 
 joking which would have touched the heart of a stone, 
 and Mary Lyddy was quick to catch at this advan 
 tage over her sister, and rose slowly from her couch. 
 The old man s eyes were blinded at coming into this 
 darkness from the glare of sunlight without, and he 
 could not see a yard before him. He already felt 
 homesick, and would have given anything if he had 
 not brought the trunk, which was just now set down 
 on one end, heavily, in the entry just behind him. 
 
 " I m real pleased to see you, though I wish you 
 had come last week, when I could have enjoyed you 
 more. I don t know when I have been so well in 
 health as I was last week, but to-day I am so troubled 
 with neurology in my head that I can hardly live. I 
 do know what there is for dinner. I told the boys 
 they must pick up a lunch somehow or other, for 
 I could n t go near a stove ; the heat of it would kill 
 
A LANDLESS FARMER. 71 
 
 me. We will get along somehow, though," she 
 added, more cheerfully, suddenly mindful of the man 
 from the farm, and anxious that he should not carry 
 back anything but a good report of her father s re 
 ception. " I declare, it does me good to see you ; " 
 and she came forward, and gave her guest, unwel 
 come as he had been the moment before, a most af 
 fectionate kiss. For all that, when Washington Tufts 
 had driven away down the street, to do some errands 
 at the stores for Sereny before he went home, Mr. 
 Jenkins watched him sadly from the door, and felt as 
 if he had burnt his ships behind him. 
 
 But his daughter was very cheerful all that day, 
 and it seemed to him in the evening as if he had done 
 the right thing. He would not look upon it as a per 
 manent change, by any means ; but what could be 
 more likely than that, not being quite fit for work, 
 he should come to pay a visit to his younger daugh 
 ter ? He imagined that everybody would wonder at 
 his being there, and apologized for it elaborately to 
 every one who came in. He received a good deal of 
 attention for a time, being well known in his county 
 and much respected ; and he had long talks with 
 Mrs. Bryan, who dearly liked conversation, and to 
 gether they recalled people and events of years be 
 fore, and the housewifely virtues of Mrs. Jenkins, 
 
72 A LANDLESS FARMER. 
 
 who had been a busy and helpful soul, of better sense 
 and deeper affections than either of her daughters. 
 The farmer was fond of saying " in your mother s 
 day," when he spoke to his children ; indeed, the 
 later years of his life had been a sad contrast to the 
 earlier, though he had not felt the change and loss 
 half so keenly until the last few months, when he 
 could no longer spend an almost untired strength and 
 energy in the ceaseless round and routine of his work. 
 Serena Nudd was not over-fond of hearing her moth 
 er s day referred to, and resented the implied supe 
 riority to her own ; but during the first of the visit 
 Mary Lyddy and her father talked about the good 
 woman to their hearts content, and Mr. Jenkins said 
 that it seemed more homelike than the old place itself 
 ever did nowadays. Serena s child was not a, pleas 
 ant boy, and he tired and fretted his grandfather in a 
 miserable way. The young Bryans kept their wrong 
 doings and laziness pretty well out of the old man s 
 sight, and their mother forbore to harangue and scold 
 them in his hearing. 
 
 The novelty and mild excitement of the visit ap 
 peared to act like a tonic upon Mrs. Bryan for a time, 
 but at length her nature began to assert itself, and 
 her guest at the same time began to be restless and 
 uneasy in his new quarters. He made short excur- 
 
A LANDLESS FARMER. 73 
 
 sions about the town, and read the newspaper with 
 unusual care ; but he was not used to seeing a daily 
 paper, and it was more reading than he really liked 
 to undertake. One of the neighbors sent it to him 
 every day, with great kindness ; but though he was 
 in many ways well treated, it seemed to him more 
 and more that he could not bear any longer to Le 
 away from home. He could not help thinking and 
 worrying about the farm work ; he did not trust 
 Aaron Nudd s judgment about the management of 
 things, and he watched the street every day anx 
 iously, in hope of seeing Serena approach in quest of 
 him. He even lamented his impatience, and took her 
 part against himself. But as the days went by, and 
 she did not appear, his heart failed him ; for he had 
 not thought they would have found it so easy to get 
 on without him. Shut up in the hot and noisy little 
 village, and seeing every day so many people whom 
 he did not know, he longed for the farm-house where 
 he had spent all his life, and he was homesick for the 
 wide outlook over the fields and woodlands, and felt 
 strangely lost and alone and old. 
 
 Mary Lyddy became querulous and tiresome ; it 
 would have made a difference to her if she had had 
 hopes of gain, and her father did not take long to dis 
 cover that ho was a burden to her as well as to Se- 
 
74 A LANDLESS FARMER. 
 
 rena. Mrs. Bryan had handed him the bill for town 
 taxes, and he had looked at her with a grieved sur 
 prise. " I have n t got the money to pay it, if that s 
 what you mean," he said at length. " I m kept on 
 short commons, I tell you. Serena was dreadful put 
 out, one day, because the dealer that takes the butter 
 called and paid his month s account, and I wanted 
 part of it to pay the minister ; she said Aaron had 
 seen to his and mine together, and went grumping 
 round the kitchen the rest o the morning. I told 
 her t was the first week since I was out o my time 
 that I had been without a dollar in my pocket. Aaron 
 cut considerable of a piece o pine growth this last 
 winter, but I never could find out what become of the 
 money. One time he had n t got settled up, and the 
 next time he began to squeal about its taking every 
 cent he could rake and scrape to keep the farm above 
 water. He flung at me about my doctor s bills once 
 or twice ; miscr ble farmer he is, any way. I have 
 got a little money they don t know about in the North 
 Bank, and I 11 get you some of it quick s I get a 
 chance to send, but I ve nobody but Aaron, and I 
 never want to say nothing to him about it. I thought 
 I might get into a straiter place than any I Ve been 
 in, and I ve been holding on to it. T ain t much, 
 but it 11 do to bury me, if they can t find the means." 
 
A LANDLESS FARMER. 75 
 
 " There, don t, father ! You make my blood run 
 cold," said Mary Lyddy, fretfully. " I m sure you 
 can t doubt but what we shall do what s proper for 
 you, dead or alive. I felt t was a mistake all the 
 time that you should n t ha kept things in your own 
 hands ; but Sereny talked all of us over at the time, 
 and well, you should have thought more about it 
 before you did it, that s all I ve got to say. I shall 
 have to get rid of this place, less the boys get to 
 earning something pretty soon, for it s more n I can 
 afford to keep. I m worse off than before I owned 
 it, having nobody to help along. Everything would 
 have gone well if poor Henry had only lived ; " and 
 she began to cry as if she meant to give a good deal 
 of time to tears, and her father took his hat and 
 walked drearily away. It was his best hat, and he 
 often wished for the old one, which he had left hang 
 ing on its nail at the farmhouse. 
 
 He hoped that he might see somebody from home, 
 and looked at the wagons and teams as they passed 
 him ; until presently somebody hailed him with a 
 cheerful " Well, uncle, you ve been and given hay 
 ing the slip this year." When the old man turned, 
 he found with delight that it was Ezra Allen, and de 
 clared that he was glad to see him. It seemed as if 
 he had n t seen any of the folks for a month ; it had 
 
76 A LANDLESS FARMER. 
 
 been the longest week he had ever spent in his life. 
 " Get in, won t ye ? " said the nephew, affectionately. 
 " Why can t ye ride over to Jack Townsend s with 
 me ? I want to see him about doing a lot of ironing 
 for my running work. I ve got three or four wagons 
 where I can t go no further with them ; and Estes is 
 sick, and won t be able to work at blacksmi thing for 
 some weeks. I want to take hold of these things 
 right away. I m about through with what little hay 
 ing I do. Been a good hay year so far, has n t it ? " 
 
 "I don t know much about it," sorrowfully con 
 fessed the old farmer, climbing slowly into the 
 wagon. 
 
 " Seems to me you are as quick as an eel to what 
 you was a month ago," said Ezra. " You look about 
 as well as ever you did ; good for ten years yet, un 
 cle Jerry," and he started the horse at a good pace. 
 There never was a more contented pair of relatives : 
 the younger man had wished for just this chance to 
 hear the particulars of the visit, and the elder one 
 was only too glad to fall in with a sympathetic com 
 panion, who had always been kind to him, and who 
 seemed now to have belonged to his better days. 
 
 " How d ye like it over here ? " inquired Ezra, 
 turning round with a beaming smile to take a good 
 look at his uncle. 
 
A LANDLESS^FARMER. 77 
 
 " "Well, fairly, * answered Mr. Jenkins, without en 
 thusiasm. " But old folks is better off at home, 
 seems to me. Mary Lyddy does the best she knows 
 how ; but the girls don t neither of em take after 
 their mother, somehow or nother ; I don t know why 
 it is. Sereny kept me feeling like a toad under a 
 harrow, and seems as if I was in the way, and sort 
 of under-foot to both houses. I done just as they 
 wanted me long in the winter, and give the reins into 
 their own hands ; but they don t like me none the 
 better for it, nor so well, far s I can see, and I don t 
 know what to do. I had n t been accustomed to 
 sickness, and when I was so afflicted in the cold 
 weather, and got down so low, I thought I d got 
 about through with things. You know I d been ailing 
 and doctoring -some months before I had the worst 
 spell come on. They never treated me so clever as 
 they did the time when I was give over, and old Dr. 
 Banks said there wa n t no help for me. But I ve 
 come up considerable, more n ever I expected, and 
 I ve had times of feeling just like myself, of late ; 
 and I see how the land lays, and between you and 
 me, Ezry, I wish it was different. I ve had my day, 
 though, and I don t want to stand in the way of no 
 body else s chance." 
 
 " Where s Parker ? Do you get any news from 
 
78 A LANDLESS FARMER. 
 
 him ? " asked Ezra, giving the horse a flick with his 
 whip, putting it quickly in its socket, and taking a 
 firm hold of the reins. He knew that his uncle was 
 fond of a good horse, and he was very proud of this 
 new one, and wished it to be noticed and praised. 
 
 " Don t hurry the beast," said the old man ; " we ve 
 got time enough, and it kind of jars me, to what 
 it used, to ride fast. When I m after a likely crea- 
 tur , such as this, that can show a good pace, I m 
 satisfied. As for Parker, I ain t heard from him for 
 hard on to eight months. He was n t prompt about 
 writing, and I ve been wanting the girls to set to 
 work and find out about him. Serena goes into a 
 dreadful frame o mind if I much as mention his 
 name, and Mary Lyddy s always going to do it the 
 next day. My eyesight s failed dreadfully ; it s 
 better n it was, but none too good. I did scratch 
 a few lines twice or three times, and send them to 
 the last place I knew him to be in, and I directed 
 once to the postmaster ; but he has made no answer 
 yet, so I keep a-hopin . Parker had his faults, and 
 perhaps I indulged him more than was good for him, 
 but he was more like his mother n any of em. He 
 and Sereny never got along. I don t s pose she 
 means it, but she s got a dreadful nagging way. I 
 did let him have a good deal o money, and I don t 
 
A LANDLESS FARMER. 79 
 
 know but it was foolish. Parker s got a quick tem 
 per, same s his mother had, but it ain t Sereny s kind. 
 She gnaws and picks all day long about a thing she 
 don t like ; but Parker 11 knock ye down with one 
 hand, and pick ye right up again with the other. 
 They re always warnin me that he was on steady, 
 and a disgrace to his folks ; but I have known many 
 a man that has had his fling, and settled down and 
 been useful afterwards. Parker s got good natural 
 ability, and I guess he 11 make his way yet if he gets 
 the right chance." 
 
 " I never could bear Aaron Nudd, if I must say 
 it," growled Ezra. "He was distressin himself the 
 other day into Henry Wallis s about being afraid all 
 the time Parker might turn up, poor, wandering 
 vagabone, he called him. I d knocked him down, if 
 I d heard him. I mean to see if I can t find where 
 Parker is. There ain t a cousin I ve got that I ever 
 set so much by, spite of his leanin in wrong direc 
 tions. We ve always been chums, spite of his being 
 so much younger, you know it, don t ye, uncle 
 Jerry? And I ve always stood up for him; I m 
 going to see if he can t have his rights if you did 
 sign that paper." 
 
 The old man s voice faltered as he tried to speak. 
 " I do know where I could ask him to, if I did send 
 
80 A LANDLESS FARMER. 
 
 for him to come home now," he said. " If / know 
 anything about a hoss, this one is the best you ever 
 drove, Ezry. Where did you pick her up ? Not 
 round here, I 11 make a guess," and the conversation 
 steered bravely out into this most congenial subject 
 to both travelers. 
 
 At ten o clock that very morning Susan Allen, 
 Ezra s wife, was bending over her ironing-board and 
 bumping away with her flat-iron, when somebody 
 suddenly came outside the window, and laid his arms 
 on the sill and looked in. At first he seemed to be 
 a stranger, and Susan was chilled from head to foot 
 with fear ; but she stared and stared again at the 
 smiling face before she spoke, and finally she clapped 
 her hands, and said, " I 11 give up if it ain t, Parker 
 Jenkins ! I want to know if that s you ? " and this 
 question of his identity having been decided, the 
 young man strolled round to the door, and came in as 
 if he had never been away. 
 
 "How s all the folks?" he asked. "Where s 
 Ezra ? I looked in at the shop first, but there was 
 nobody there." 
 
 u We did n t know but you was dead," said Susan, 
 who was much excited. " Your father has been 
 dreadful distressed about you. I do think you ought 
 
A LANDLESS^FARMER. 81 
 
 to have wrote him, Parker. But you can make up 
 with him easy enough ; he 11 be glad enough to see 
 you." 
 
 The visitor had looked very solemn as he listened 
 to the first mention of his father s name, but his ex 
 pression quickly changed to a look of wild astonish 
 ment. " Do you mean to tell me father is n t dead ? " 
 he said, rising to his feet. 
 
 " Dead, no ! " answered Susan. u He had a long 
 spell of sickness, beginning in the fall of the year, 
 and we all supposed he was breaking up ; and along 
 in the first of the winter he had a very bad time, 
 when we give him up for certain, and there was two 
 days and a night when they thought he might be 
 taken away any minute ; but he pulled through " 
 
 Parker had seated himself again, and did not seem 
 to be listening to this account. He had put his head 
 on his arm down upon the ironing-board, and was 
 crying like a child. Susan felt as if this were a some 
 what theatrical performance, and a little unnecessary. 
 She was vaguely reminded of his being addicted to 
 drink, and of the story of the Prodigal Son ; and 
 then she noticed how broad his shoulders had grown, 
 and that his coat was made of a beautiful piece of 
 cloth, and that he was quite citified in his appear 
 ance. 
 
 6 
 
82 A LANDLESS FARMER. 
 
 " Don t take on so," she begged him nervously, 
 after a few minutes, for it made her very ill at ease. 
 
 And the unexpected guest lifted his head presently 
 and wiped his eyes with a handsome, bright-colored 
 silk handkerchief. " I never had anything come 
 over me so in my life," he said, beginning to laugh 
 in the midst of his tears. " I must go right up to the 
 house and see him. Serena wrote me along in the 
 winter that they d give him up, and he would n t be 
 alive when I got the letter. They did n t expect him 
 to get through the afternoon. I never heard any 
 more from her, and I ve mourned him as dead. I 
 wrote on to Ezra to tell me the particulars ; for 
 after finding Serena did n t write again, I got mad 
 with her, and then I got mad with Ezra because he 
 did n t write, and I thought you were all banded to 
 gether to kick me over." 
 
 " He never got the letter," said Susan. " I hope 
 to die if he ever did, Parker. The last letter that 
 ever came inside this house from you was one Ezra 
 got, saying you were going out into the mining coun 
 try. You know you ain t much of a hand to write, 
 nor Ezra neither ; but of course he would have an 
 swered such a letter as that, and told you your father 
 was living. I don t know but he 11 see him this 
 morning. The old gentleman went over to stop with 
 Mary Lyddy for a while." 
 
A LANDLESS f^ARMER. 83 
 
 Parker had been standing by the door for the last 
 few minutes, as if he were impatient to be off; but 
 he came back wonderingly into the room again, and 
 Susan, after prefacing her remarks with " Well, I 
 may s well tell you first as last," embarked upon a 
 minute explanation of the state of affairs. 
 
 The young man seemed at last to be able to listen 
 to no more. He threw off his coat, and sat by the 
 window in his shirt sleeves, and when he had kept 
 quiet as long as was possible he indulged in some 
 very strong language, and expressed feelings toward 
 his sister Serena and Aaron Nudd that would have 
 startled them a good deal if they had been within 
 hearing. He was outraged at their conniving to get 
 all the property into their own hands in his absence, 
 and at first he threatened them with such terrors of 
 the law that Susan began to shake in her shoes, and 
 became as afraid of his anger as if she had been only 
 a mole burrowing in the mountain side, which had 
 started an avalanche downward on its path of de 
 struction. It was a solemn scene when Parker 
 Jenkins met his sister, early in the afternoon ; but by 
 that time Susan had become so vised to excitements 
 of this kind her own explanations and the accom 
 panying comments having been repeated after Ezra s 
 return that she had. a feeling of envy when she 
 
84 A LANDLESS FARMER. 
 
 saw her husband and his cousin marching away to 
 ward the farmhouse. " I don t know now what it was 
 fetched me here," Parker was saying. " I made up 
 my mind forty times that I never would set foot in 
 side town limits again ; but I wanted to be sure 
 everything was right and proper in the burying lot, 
 and it seemed as if you would set some things straight 
 that I could n t understand, any way I looked at em, 
 and I wanted to let folks see I had n t quite run to 
 seed." 
 
 Serena s face was a picture of defenseless misery 
 when she first caught sight of her brother. She had 
 had a long, hard morning s work already, and she 
 felt guilty and on the losing side. Parker had 
 passed through his unreasoning storm of rage, and 
 had sailed into smoother but very deep waters of 
 contempt. He said very little beyond remarking 
 that, not having heard anything after her last letter, 
 he had supposed that his father was dead. He an 
 nounced in the course of conversation that he had 
 done well, on the whole, and that he did not think he 
 should return to Colorado at present. 
 
 Serena was pale and crimson by turns, and tried 
 her best to be affectionate and conciliatory. She 
 ventured at last to speak of her father, and to say 
 
A LANDLESS FARMER. 85 
 
 that somebody should go over to the Mills and bring 
 him home that very afternoon. " We 11 have supper 
 late, and he 11 be here by that time. You 11 find 
 him a good deal changed, but it s nothing to what he 
 was in the winter," she said, fearfully. 
 
 Parker fixed his eyes on her, and presently gave a 
 contemptuous little laugh. Ezra s excitement reached 
 its topmost pitch. 
 
 " Serena ! " said the returned wanderer, " I should 
 think you d be ashamed to come near decent folks,, 
 I ve no right to boast, and I ve been a confounded 
 fool, I 11 own, but I never set to work to cheat folks, 
 or to sneak, or to lose folks respect, so that I could 
 have one more dirty dollar tucked away in the bank. 
 As far as I can find out, you have cheated me and 
 Mary Lyddy out of our rights, and you have treated 
 your poor old father anything but Christian. As for 
 Aaron Nudd, I won t have anything to say to such 
 cattle. The writings you got from father won t stand 
 one minute in the eye of the law, but your false pre 
 tenses and your tricks, will, and if either of you 
 make any trouble I 11 just fix you so you 11 wish 
 you d held your peace. I may have shown signs of 
 being a scapegrace, and being gone hook and sinker ; 
 but I m older than I was when I went off, and though 
 I don t make no boasts, as I say, I don t mean my 
 
86 A LANDLESS FARMER. 
 
 folks shall ever be ashamed of me. I m going over 
 myself to fetch father home, and afterward I m going 
 to stay here, and you can do as you see fit." 
 
 It was only three or four days after this that, late 
 on a Sunday afternoon, Parker and Ezra Allen 
 stood on the little bridge over the brook. Parker 
 was fashionably dressed. He had attracted a good 
 deal more attention than the minister, that day, for 
 he had accompanied his father to church, and had re 
 ceived congratulations on his return from all his ac 
 quaintances. Old Mr. Jenkins was so happy that he 
 smiled continually, and glanced round proudly at his 
 son when he should have been listening to the ser 
 mon. It seemed to him a greater proof of the prov 
 idence of God than had ever before been vouchsafed 
 him, and he appeared to have taken, as everybody 
 said, a new lease of life. 
 
 " Done well, out there among the mines, you 
 said ? " inquired Ezra, somewhat indifferently, though 
 he was eager to ask a few questions before any other 
 neighbor should join them. 
 
 " First rate," responded Parker ; " though I 
 have n t made the fortunes some do. Trouble is, 
 you either lose all you ve got, or else you have luck, 
 and then get picked off with a bullet from behind a 
 
A LANDLESS FARMER. 87 
 
 bush. We struck a good vein in a claim I had shares 
 in, and some fellows were out there from New York 
 wanting to buy a good mining property, and well, 
 I 11 tell you all about it some day ; but the end of it 
 was, I sold out to them for twenty-five thousand 
 dollars. I think they chuckled over it lively, and 
 thought they d made an awful good thing out of 
 me ; but I said to myself that a bird in the hand s 
 worth two in the bush. You see they had n t been 
 taking out much of any ore each side of us. I had 
 some thoughts of going into business with a fellow I 
 know in New York. We come on East together ; 
 but I don t know what I shall do. It seems pleasant 
 at the old place, and father he holds on to me. I 
 don t take much to farming, but I ve thought a good 
 many times what a chance there is to raise cran 
 berries up here in the swamp. I ve got forty notions. 
 I ll wait a while before I settle down anywhere. I 
 can afford to." 
 
 u Aaron Nudd told Asa Parsons yesterday that he 
 guessed he should go over to Harlow s Mills quick s 
 the crops were in, and take a place in the boxing 
 room at the shoe factory they ve been urging him to 
 fill," said Ezra, with a wise smile. 
 
 " I d just as soon he would, for my part," said 
 Parker. " They re both soft-spoken and meaching 
 
88 A LANDLESS FARMER. 
 
 as any two you ever saw, and Sereny makes excuses 
 about things from morning to night, worse than poor 
 Mary Lyddy ever thought of. I don know, but I 
 never did seem to have a right sort o feelin for the 
 girls. But it pleases me to death to see how satisfied 
 the old gentleman is. It kind of makes me feel bad, 
 Ezra. I guess I shall steady down for good ; but 
 I ve seen something of hard times and raking round, 
 for a fellow of my age. I ain t one to talk religious, 
 but I m going to look after father ; he does set every 
 thing by me, don t he ? Arid a more homesick man I 
 never saw, than he was sitting in the front door over 
 there to Mary Lyddy s. He s got quite a notion, since 
 I spoke of it, of setting out a lot of cranberries. I 
 pointed out to him how well the land lay for it, and 
 the springs watered it just right. I ve seen a good 
 deal of em down towards the Cape. I was there 
 some time, you know, when I first cleared out from 
 home. But there, I m a roving fellow by nature. I 
 sha n t make any plans yet a while." 
 
 " There was an awful sight of water come down 
 out of the swamp this last spring," said Ezra, turning 
 to look at the brook. " I ve always heard cran 
 berries was an uncertain crop, and don t you go 
 throwing away your means till you know what you re 
 about. But you stick to the old gentleman, Parker ; 
 
A LANDLESS FARMER. 89 
 
 if ever I pitied a man in my life, it was him, this 
 summer." 
 
 It was soon observed how Mr. Jerry Jenkins had 
 improved in health and spirits since his son s return. 
 He resumed his place in society, and entered upon 
 such duties as fell to his share with pleased alacrity. 
 He was complimented on his recovery, and though 
 some grumbling people, who always chose to be on 
 the off side, spoke with pity of the Nudds, and ex 
 pressed a sympathy for Aaron s having undertaken 
 the farm only to be ousted, other people thought of 
 them with scorn. However, worldly prosperity is 
 one of the surest titles to respect, and after it was 
 known that Aaron had bought an interest in one of 
 the shoe-manufacturing companies at Harlow s Mills 
 he was looked up to as much as he deserved, at any 
 rate, and possibly more. Some people who knew 
 him held him up as an example of its being worth 
 while to save and be thrifty ; but Ezra Allen and 
 others of his way of thinking could not use hard 
 enough language to suit themselves, whenever his 
 name was mentioned. Serena was much more popu 
 lar in the village than her sister. She dressed con 
 spicuously, as she thought became her station, and she 
 took an active part in church matters, being very 
 
90 A LANDLESS FARMER. 
 
 efficient in the sewing society and the social relations 
 of the parish. She assented emphatically to all the 
 doctrines, and insisted upon the respectability of the 
 Christian virtues ; but it must be owned that she 
 practiced very few of them which related to the well- 
 being and comfort of other people. She and Aaron 
 and their boy drove out to the farm occasionally, in a 
 shiny top-buggy, to see her father, and such visits 
 were outwardly successful and harmonious. 
 
 At the farm itself life went on smoothly. Mr. 
 Jenkins had been troubled at first with many fears, 
 when he found that Serena was really going to depart 
 early in the fall, after her brother s return, and he 
 could not forbear some expressions of wonder at her 
 sudden change of feeling in regard to farming. She 
 constantly said that she had never liked it, that it was 
 a dog s life for any woman to do the housework on a 
 large farm ; and her father only replied that her tune 
 had changed a good deal within a year. He took a 
 long breath as he saw her go away in a heavily laden 
 wagon, which preceded the team in which her house 
 hold goods were being moved to the Mills. She 
 had waited until the last minute, as if she feared that 
 some treasures might be abstracted from the load. 
 " She s about stripped the house," said Mr. Jenkins, 
 with a chuckle, as he came back into the kitchen ; 
 
A LANDLESS FARMER. 91 
 
 " but we 11 get along somehow, Parker. I ve done 
 the best I could by her, I know that ! " 
 
 Parker chuckled in his turn. " She s an awful 
 grabber," said he. " I m hanged if I did n t catch 
 her down cellar this morning fishing into the pork 
 barrel ; she did n t hear me coming, and she was 
 started, and let a piece drop, and it sent the brine all 
 up into her face and eyes." 
 
 " It can t be possible that new barrel is so low as 
 that a ready," said the old man. " I guess she had 
 made a good haul before you come. Well, I m glad, 
 I m sure. I should n t want any child o mine to be 
 without pork. And there was times Sereny was 
 right down clever and pleasant spoken. I don t 
 blame her for wanting to be where there is more go- 
 
 o O 
 
 ing forrard, if she takes a notion to it." 
 
 As for Parker Jenkins, he settled down on the 
 old farm, as many another New Englishman has 
 done, after two or three voyages at sea, or long 
 journeys in quest of wealth to California or Texas or 
 the Western country. He looked upon himself as 
 being much more a man of the world than his neigh 
 bors, and his consideration for his old father was 
 most delightful. The housekeeping went on well 
 enough under the auspices of a cousin, a good, sensi- 
 
92 A LANDLESS FARMER. 
 
 ble woman, who was set adrift just in good time for 
 these two unprotected men by the death of her own 
 father, who had been for some years dependent on 
 her care. It was soon known, however, that the 
 chief reason of young Jenkins s contentment with so 
 quiet a life was his attraction toward a pretty daughter 
 of his neighbor, Asa Parsons, who was only too ready 
 to smile upon so pleasant and good-looking a person, 
 while her father and mother were mindful of his 
 wealth. 
 
 So we leave the old farmer, no longer feeling cast 
 off and desolate, to live out the rest of his days. He 
 forgot even the worst of his sorrows in that unhappy 
 winter and summer. It seemed as if most of them 
 had been fanciful and connected with his illness. 
 Serena was apt to be reminded oftener and oftener, 
 as he grew older, of how impossible he found it to 
 get on comfortably without his old secretary, and she 
 came to regret deep ly that her love for gain had al 
 lowed her to part with it, when the craze for old 
 furniture reached Harlow s Mills in its most unreason 
 ing form, and a piece of furniture that could be called 
 centennial was a credit to its owner. 
 
 The old man often said that his illness had broken 
 him down ; and that he had never been the same man 
 since. Those of his neighbors who had known his 
 
A LANDLESS FARMER. 93 
 
 sorrows, and the pain which had been harder to bear 
 than the long sickness itself, were glad that this 
 blessed Indian summer had come to him to warm him 
 through and through, and smile upon him in the late 
 autumn of his life s year. 
 
 Heaven only knows the story of the lives that the 
 gray old New England farmhouses have sheltered 
 and hidden away from curious eyes as best they 
 might. Stranger dramas than have ever been writ 
 ten belong to the dull-looking, quiet homes, that have 
 seen generation after generation live and die. On 
 the well-worn boards of these provincial theatres the 
 great plays of life, the comedies and tragedies, with 
 their lovers and conspirators and clowns ; their Ju 
 liets and Ophelias, Shylocks and King Lears, are 
 acted over and over and over again. 
 
A NEW PARISHIONER. 
 
 IT was about half-past ten o clock in the forenoon, 
 and the time of year was late September. Miss 
 Lydia Dunn was busy in her kitchen, where the 
 faded sunlight lay across the floor, and the after- 
 breakfast work was beginning to give way to the 
 preparations for dinner. Miss Dunn had lived alone 
 through a good many years, but, to use her own fa 
 vorite remark, she always treated herself as if she 
 were a whole family. 
 
 " I found myself living at the pantry shelves, quick 
 as mother died," she said. " It did n t seem to be 
 worth while to set a table and get a lot of dishes 
 about just for one. I got so I stopped the baker 
 every time he come by, and the end of it was I 
 did n t eat any oftener than I could help. I took to 
 being low in my mind, and thought I wa n t ever 
 going to be any more use in the world ; and I was 
 always reading some yaller old sermon books, that I 
 never should if I had been well ; it seemed as if they 
 
A NEW PARISHIONER. 95 
 
 had been laying about the house hoping to get a 
 chance to gnaw somebody, for they worked me up 
 dreadfully. Mother and I had lived together so long 
 that I missed her, seemed as if I could n t never 
 get used to living alone ; but at last it come to me 
 what part o the trouble was, and I set right to, and 
 from that day to this I ve given myself three good 
 regular meals every day. I tell you, you must feed 
 folks same as you do creaturs, if you want to get any 
 kind o work out of em." 
 
 It was certainly a blessing to other people that 
 Miss Dunn had come to this wise decision, for, after 
 the death of her mother, who had needed all her 
 daughter s care in the later years of her life, she had 
 always been more than ready to use her freedom and 
 strength and good sense in other people s behalf. 
 She had a great deal of sound discretion, and a quick 
 insight into men and things on which she valued her 
 self not a little, as well she mi^ht. If she had been 
 
 7 O 
 
 bad-tempered she would have been feared, for she 
 had a quick wit and a bitter impatience with shifti 
 ness and deceit ; but her bark was worse than her 
 bite, and one after another of her neighbors and 
 townspeople were helped by her over hard places in 
 their lives, and every year they grew more strongly 
 attached to her. It is true that she was often thought 
 
96 A NEW PARISHIONER. 
 
 a little hard, and that she gained the ill-will of some 
 of her associates whose lives were not wholly spent 
 in following the paths of rectitude. She sometimes 
 felt sorry that there was nobody who belonged to her, 
 or who really loved her because they were of the 
 same flesh and blood. It is a rare thing to find a 
 woman of her age in a New England village who has 
 no near relations ; for when there was less inter 
 course with the rest of the world than nowadays, and 
 families were larger, the people were apt to be closely 
 connected by frequent intermarriages, and it made a 
 community of interest and a clannishness which had 
 many advantages in spite of its defects. Now that 
 the young people go from the farming communities 
 to the shops and factories of the larger towns, they 
 are surer to marry strangers and foreigners than their 
 old schoolmates and playmates, and the state of soci 
 ety in these latter days in such a town as Walton is 
 pretty well disintegrated. 
 
 Miss Dunn s grandfather had been the minister of 
 Walton for forty years. That of itself gave her a 
 right to assert herself in parish matters, and her in 
 herited love of reading and thinking helped her to 
 look oftener at the principles and causes of things 
 than at their incidents and effects. The elder people 
 of the town still turned back with reverence to the 
 
A NEW PARISHIONER. 97 
 
 deeds and opinions of old Parson Dunn, and gave an 
 honored place in their councils to his upright and 
 straightforward granddaughter. 
 
 On this Friday morning she felt uncommonly well 
 and active, and had been scurrying about her house 
 ever since she had waked, sweeping and dusting, and 
 putting things to rights generally. She remembered 
 her mother s saying that all out-doors always seemed 
 to try to get under cover before cold weather, and 
 she angrily threw away the collections of dust and lint 
 which she swept up in one room after another. When 
 she had finished her own room she came out, bring 
 ing the broom and dust-pan and duster all at once, 
 and before she began to get dinner she stood for 
 a minute before the small glass in the case of the 
 kitchen clock. The big gingham handkerchief was 
 still tied over her head, to keep the dust off, and she 
 took a good look at herself. 
 
 " You re getting along in years, that s a fact, 
 Lyddy Dunn," said she, good-naturedly ; and then 
 she sighed, and put away the handkerchief in its 
 drawer, and went forward with some preparations for 
 dinner. 
 
 The house in which she lived was one that her 
 grandfather had bought in his last days, and in which 
 his son had lived after him. There was no village in 
 7 
 
98 A NEW PARISHIONER. 
 
 Walton, at least in that part of it, but farm joined 
 farm, and there was no waste land. The main road 
 of the town traversed a long ridge from end to end ; 
 the old church stood at the very top, blown by all 
 the winds of heaven, like a ship on the high seas, 
 and on the southern slope, close at the road-side, was 
 Miss Dunn s house. 
 
 The front of it faced the south, and the front door 
 opened into a prim little garden, where some shel 
 tered hollyhocks and china asters still lingered ; be 
 yond was an orchard, where many of the old trees 
 had died or been blown down, and ha4 been replaced 
 by young ones. The leaves were falling fast now, 
 but nothing held on better than the apple and lilac- 
 leaves, and these were growing browner, and rustling 
 louder when the wind blew, day by day. Miss Dunn 
 was very fond of her house. The main part of it 
 had two rooms on each floor ; but the lower roof of 
 it, that covered the big kitchen and down-stairs bed 
 room and the great kitchen-chamber, was older than 
 the other, and was gambrel-shaped, and had for its 
 centre an enormous chimney, that was, as it should 
 be, the warm heart of the house. 
 
 The outer kitchen door opened to the road in a 
 most hospitable fashion, and some smooth gray flag 
 stones, like a stray bit of sidewalk, led along under 
 
A NEW PARISHIONER. 99 
 
 the kitchen windows as far as the front gate. Miss 
 Dunn suddenly bethought herself to sweep these, and 
 brought her second-best broom. There was a pleas 
 ant fragrance of faded leaves in the air ; the sunshine 
 was very warm, and the maple leaves seemed to have 
 fallen too soon on the thick green grass, which still 
 looked as fresh as if it were June. In the lowlands 
 far below there was a most lovely blur and haze with 
 the misty air and the colors of the trees ; the sky 
 was cloudless but a little dim, and the snowberry 
 bushes rustled so over the fence, in the breeze that 
 came past the corner of the house, that our friend 
 looked around at them as if somebody had spoken. 
 A little stick, that was shaped like some thin, twisted 
 mockery of a human being, was lying against the 
 kitchen door-step, as if it had tried to climb in and 
 had failed ; and Lydia Dunn stooped to pick it up, 
 and perched it on the outside window-sill, where it 
 stood with one foot crooked into the little staple to 
 which the blind was sometimes hooked, and seemed 
 to look into the kitchen wistfully. 
 
 Miss Dunn smiled as she looked at it, and had a 
 feeling flit over her that something was going to hap 
 pen ; there was an uncanny look about the strange 
 bit of a lilac bush. She caught the sound of an ap 
 proaching footstep, and as quick as one of the leaves 
 
100 A NEW PARISHIONER. 
 
 that were flittering about at her feet she went back 
 into the house again. She knew well enough the 
 familiar figure that was still some distance away down 
 the road, and was sure that she was to have a visit. 
 She was much attached to Jonas Phipps, and quite 
 dependent on his assistance in her housekeeping, but 
 she always felt a little antagonistic and on the off 
 side of things when he first made his appearance. 
 
 " Of course he must put into port here for his din 
 ner, when I ve had a busy forenoon ! " she said an 
 grily, and began to change the kettles about on the 
 stove ; and she whisked the tea-kettle over to the 
 sink as if she were putting it in jail for its sins, but 
 it went on singing cheerfully, as if it had a good 
 conscience. 
 
 Presently the latch clicked, and Mr. Jonas Phipps 
 came in at the door, closing it softly after him ; and 
 as he felt at once that unmistakable lack of welcome 
 which was not unusual, he dropped his hat on the 
 floor beside the chair he dropped himself into, and 
 took a long breath to show that he was much fatigued. 
 He was a lame man, and there was something appeal 
 ing about him, as well as something indescribably 
 shrewd and quick, the helplessness of a wounded 
 and hampered fox or other cunning creature, that 
 has not the physical strength to make the best use 
 of its instincts. 
 
A NEW PARISHIONER. 101 
 
 " There, do spudge up a little, Jonas," said Miss 
 Lydia, moving to and fro about the kitchen as fast 
 as she could. " You remind me of an old limp cal 
 ico bag that s hung up against the wall, nothing to 
 take out of it, and every chance to put in." 
 
 Jonas brightened up at once, and sat erect, as if 
 his hostess had furnished him with a backbone. 
 
 "You always have your joke," said he, chuckling. 
 " Ain t nothing I could do for you to-day, I ex 
 pect?" 
 
 " I m about out of kindling wood," said Miss 
 Dunn, doubtfully. " I suppose you know that as well 
 as I do. I thought you were going to get Otis s boy 
 to help you, and cut me up a good lot of small wood 
 some time this week. You d better stop, now you re 
 here, though to-morrow will do just as well, and 
 you can come earlier in the forenoon." 
 
 " To-morrow and Monday I Ve got to be off 
 both them days," said Jonas, not without pride. 
 "You 11 have to take me when you can git me, for 
 once ; " and putting on his much-battered hat he 
 shuffled toward the door that led out to the woodshed. 
 " Have you heard I s pose you have that Henry 
 Stroud, old Ben Stroud s oldest son, has come back, 
 and is stopping over to Whiteho use s tavern ? He 
 was over here driving about yesterday afternoon, and 
 
102 A NEW PARISHIONER. 
 
 he stopped to have some talk with me. I had an 
 errand over Donnell s way to help him get in his cab 
 bages, but they d got them all in before I got there. 
 I thought it was Thursday he wanted me, but when 
 I got there he said it was Wednesday ; " and Jonas 
 was silent, as if he wished to respectfully give place 
 to the scolding Miss Dunn commonly furnished him 
 with at such confessions of his laziness. 
 
 But she merely laughed, and then asked, " What s 
 he here for ? He can t think that anybody is in dis 
 tress to see him." 
 
 " I don t know what he come for, unless he wanted 
 to look round his old haunts. He bespoke me to go 
 up to his father s place with him to set things to 
 rights in the burying lot. I told him I was n t much 
 of a hand for such things now, count of my lameness, 
 but I d do what I could. He was real friendly and 
 free-spoken, and knowed me right away. Him and 
 me s about of an age, sixty-two in the month of 
 January next ; " and Jonas went slowly out to the 
 woodshed, and began to chop the large sticks of 
 pine into kindlings with leisurely blows, as if there 
 were no hurry about either that or anything else. 
 
 " Well, I do declare ! " said Miss Lydia Dunn. 
 " I wonder what will happen next ! " She longed to 
 question Jonas further, but she did not; and later, 
 
A NEW PARISHIONER. 103 
 
 when the soup that she had been warming for her 
 own dinner was in readiness to be eaten, she carried 
 out a comfortable bowlful to him, and set it down 
 without a word. 
 
 " Now I call that real clever of ye," said Mr. 
 Phipps. " I was just lowing I d better be getting 
 home to my dinner, 7 which was a great lie, since 
 he had been sniffing the fragrance of the soup and 
 expecting this provision eagerly for at least half an 
 hour. 
 
 " I suppose Henry Stroud must have aged a good 
 deal ? " she asked, lingering for a minute in the door 
 way. 
 
 " Not so much as you might suppose, seeing he s 
 been gone thirty-five years, no, forty years it must 
 be, or rising forty. It was the fall after his father 
 died, and Henry was out of his time the spring be 
 fore. Well, he s got the ginooine Stroud looks ; he s 
 featured for all the world like the old man. I know 
 it was forty years sence he died, because that was the 
 year we moved over to the Ashby place, fork of 
 the roads as you go to Knowles s mills. The house 
 is been gone this gre t while." 
 
 "There, your soup 11 all get cold, Jonas," said 
 Miss Dunn, impatiently, and at once retreated to the 
 kitchen, fearing that the accounts of the changes of 
 
104 A NEW PARISHIONER. 
 
 residence of the Phipps family might otherwise be 
 continued all the rest of the afternoon. Jonas liked 
 nothing better than to tell long stories, involving in 
 finite ramblings and details, to any audience he was 
 able to muster. 
 
 That evening Miss Dunn stood looking out of the 
 window down the road, noticing the lights in the 
 houses. She always had a fancy for sitting a while 
 in the twilight, after supper, which came early at this 
 time of year, when the days were growing so short ; 
 and before she lit her lamp she liked to take a survey 
 of the neighborhood and of the sky. The stars were 
 bright and the weather was satisfactory, but from one 
 of the three houses which were in sight there was an 
 unusual radiance, and our friend saw at once, to her 
 surprise, that there was a lamp in the best parlor. 
 Nothing could be more amazing than this, and at 
 first Miss Dunn thought that some member of the 
 family had gone into the room on an errand, it being 
 used as to its closet for a treasure chamber. 
 
 " I hope that old Mr. Singer has n t been taken 
 with one of his bad ill turns," she said to herself, 
 anxiously. "I know they always keep some spirit 
 in that closet." But the light shone steadily on like 
 a beacon, until there was no room for doubt that the 
 Singers had company to tea. 
 
A NEW PARISHIONER. 105 
 
 At last Miss Dunn composed herself to her even 
 ing s work of knitting and reading together, and 
 resolutely drew and bolted the close shutters and 
 lighted the lamp. She was very fond of reading, 
 but there was only a small harvest of books to be 
 reaped in Walton, and she was just then working her 
 way through a dull memoir of an injudicious and un 
 happy man who had mistaken his calling and tried to 
 preach. The book was written by some one who 
 ought to have profited by this sad example ; and 
 Miss Dunn, who knew a good book when she saw it, 
 but would usually rather have a dull one than none 
 at all, soon read the less and knitted the more, until 
 the leaves of the volume fluttered up unheeded, and 
 she lost her place without observing it. She really 
 had too much to think about, herself, to give her 
 mind to other people s thoughts. Her excitements 
 and pleasures were like the pasturage that sheep find 
 near the sea ; like those delicious nibbles close to the 
 rocks, which have a flavor that no inland field can 
 give to its plentiful grass blades. Henry Stroud had 
 come back. He had once shown a great liking for 
 her, when they were boy and girl, which she had 
 disdained and her family disapproved. More than 
 this, which was a half-forgotten memory, at that very 
 moment an unknown company was assembled under 
 
106 A NEW PARISHIONER. 
 
 her neighbor s roof. What dismal tale of a life that 
 had made its failures through stupidity could wile her 
 mind from such diversions ? It was difficult to even 
 guess at the reasons that had led to Mr. Stroud s 
 return. His history was little known to his old ac 
 quaintances, except that at one time he had been 
 very rich in South America, and had afterwards 
 failed in his business. And after saying to the sub 
 ject of the memoir that he was an old dromedary, if 
 ever there was one, Miss Lydia Dunn gave herself 
 up to reflection, until she was so sleepy that she 
 could hardly stumble off to bed. The lights were not 
 out even then at the Singers . 
 
 Early the next morning, Mary Ann Singer came 
 up the road with a little pitcher to borrow some 
 yeast, and Miss Lydia gave her a cordial welcome. 
 
 " We re sort of behindhand this forenoon," the 
 visitor said, " for we had company last night." 
 
 " I noticed the best room was lighted up," said 
 Miss Dunn, with the full expectation of hearing all 
 about it. 
 
 " You see, just before tea we saw a buggy drive 
 up, and a stranger come in and asked to see the folks. 
 I thought he was an agent or something, but it was 
 a Mr. Stroud, who used to live here when he was a 
 boy. He has been most all over the world, and he a 
 
A NEW PART&HIONER. 107 
 
 come back to see the old place. I just wish you 
 could have heard him talk ; it was splendid. He says 
 he don t know but he may settle here, for sum 
 mers, at any rate. His health s broke down, being 
 in hot climates, and he said two or three times he 
 did n t mean to do any more business. I guess he s 
 rich ; he looked as if he had means. He inquired 
 for you, and said he was going to call and see you." 
 
 " Much obliged to him," said Miss Dunn, grudg 
 ingly. 
 
 " He s stopping over to Whitehouse s tavern," said 
 Mary Ann. " I never saw anything better than the 
 clothes he had on, and everything about him spoke of 
 wealth. He said he had been to see the minister, 
 and he meant to do something for the church, on ac 
 count of his mother s being a member." 
 
 " More n ever his father was," said Miss Dunn. 
 " I ain t going to say anything gainst Henry Stroud 
 without having seen him these forty years ; but he 
 wa n t much thought of as a young fellow, and his 
 father cheated my poor old grandfather out of about 
 all he had, except this place. I don t like the breed ; 
 but then, as I say, I ain t going to run a man down I 
 don t know." 
 
 " He seemed to be religious," said Mary Ann, who 
 was unwilling to have the glory of her guest tarnished 
 
108 A NEW PARISHIONER. 
 
 in this way ; and Miss Dunn responded that religion 
 ought to make some difference, if it was the real 
 kind ; after which young and inexperienced Miss 
 Singer went away with the yeast, somewhat crest 
 fallen. 
 
 " Guess they must be going to bake Sunday, if 
 they have n t got their bread a-going yet," thought 
 Miss Dunn. " I d a put it to rise after he went off, 
 last night, if it had been me ; but I suppose they 
 were all so betwattled they did n t know which end 
 they was on. I should think it would be a lesson to 
 em to air out that south setting-room once or twice 
 a month. Between being scared of the dust in the 
 summer and not using it after the cold weather comes, 
 the air don t get changed three times a year. And 
 come to heat it up with an air-tight stove ! " 
 
 The next day being Sunday, and the weather be 
 ing fair, there was an unusually large congregation 
 in the church ; and the news of the stranger s coming 
 having flown far and wide, all eyes were ready to 
 follow him, as he walked up the aisle behind the 
 minister to the parsonage pew. The minister s wife 
 betrayed a consciousness of being in unaccustomed 
 society ; and when the guest and the parson both 
 waited to usher her into the pew, it was most annoy 
 ing to stumble and almost fall over the crickets, on 
 
A NEW PARISHIONER. 109 
 
 the way to her seat. Her face was very red, as she 
 picked herself up, and even the children all looked 
 that way as they heard the loud and sudden noise. 
 
 Mr. Stroud listened intently to the sermon. He 
 was a good-looking man, but he had a difficulty in 
 looking you straight in the eyes, and he was dressed 
 in a way that his former townspeople could not fail 
 to admire. And when the service was over, and the 
 Sunday - school was assembled, Mr. Peckham, the 
 minister, called upon Brother Stroud to lead in 
 prayer ; and Brother Stroud prayed long and elo 
 quently, greatly to the approval of his hearers. It 
 was really very pleasant to find that a man so dis 
 tinguished in his appearance had so good a memory 
 for his old friends. He seemed to remember every 
 body who remembered him, and was always ready 
 to remind his old acquaintances of things that had 
 happened before he went away, while he spoke of 
 the departed members of the parish to their living 
 connections with much interest and sympathy. On 
 that first Sunday there was a great loitering about 
 and hand-shaking ; in fact, there was not the usual 
 hurry to get the horses unfastened and to start for 
 home. Miss Dunn said to herself often, in those 
 first days, that she could understand the young folks 
 running after him, but she should think the old ones, 
 
110 A NEW PARISHIONER. 
 
 that had known him root and branch, would rather 
 wait a while. She could not explain even to herself 
 the feeling of antipathy that rushed over her at the 
 first sight of him. She grudged all the deference 
 and civilities that were shown him, and yet she was 
 obliged to acknowledge that he deserved considera 
 tion, and that he was fine-looking and had a good 
 manner, "a way with him," most of the people 
 said. He seemed disposed to be very friendly and 
 generous. The young people admired him a good 
 deal, and from the very first he received great atten 
 tion and hospitality. 
 
 Mr. Peckham was more delighted with this new 
 
 3 
 
 parishioner than any one else, for he saw in him the 
 promise of help for some of his cherished projects. 
 His predecessor had been an old - school parson, 
 preaching sound and harmless sermons twice on every 
 Sunday ; exchanging with his brother ministers with 
 due regularity and suitable infrequency. Old Mr. 
 Duncan had been much loved and respected. The 
 joys and sorrows of his congregation rarely were dis 
 connected from him ; for he was a cheerful soul, most 
 fatherly and kind, and was not instinctively set aside 
 entirely to the performance of ecclesiastical rites and 
 ceremonies. Under his care the church and parish 
 existed in a most comfortable fashion, and the aver- 
 
A NEW PARISHIONER. Ill 
 
 age of things was kept up year after year. It was 
 somewhat of a shock to the parishioners to find that 
 Mr. Peckham considered all these years unfruitful, 
 and the revival which followed his teachings, or led 
 them, in the first winter of his settlement, seemed to 
 cast blame, by contrast, on the orderly progress of 
 the former additions to the church membership. Mr. 
 Peckham was an earnest, excitable, self-denying little 
 man, though his self-denials were often in further 
 ance of his own selfish ends. He was ambitious and 
 ascetic, and he was apt to be dyspeptic and low in 
 his mind, which he and his parishioners occasionally 
 mistook for anxiety and discouragement over the 
 wickedness and willfulness of this world in general. 
 He liked to have a good deal going on, though he 
 bewailed the exhaustive nature of a clergyman s work ; 
 and just now he was trying hard to get the people of 
 his parish to build a vestry, or small chapel-like build 
 ing, for the benefit of the Sunday-school and of even 
 ing meetings. 
 
 But the slow old farmers were not disposed to 
 move in a hurry. They were too tired and sleepy to 
 go to any meetings after dark, especially when they 
 lived far from the church, as most of them did ; and 
 unless there was something that really promised a 
 sufficient reward ^of excitement and interest, they 
 
112 A NEW PARISHIONER. 
 
 held their evening meetings at home. They had an 
 unexpressed conviction that the large attendance 
 at the revival meetings of the winter before could 
 not be expected to last, though Mr. Peckham were 
 never so eloquent. One old man, who was rarely 
 absent from his pew on Sundays, from one end of 
 the year to the other, said impressively to his neigh 
 bor, as they unfastened their horses from the long, 
 well-gnawed hitching-rail at the back of the church, 
 " I don t see, Silas, why there *s any need we should 
 build a second-sized meetin -house, for the good o 
 the six or eight women folks who goes reg lar to the 
 evening meetin s. There s double the expense for 
 heatin the two buildin s every Sunday v and long s 
 they always had the Sabbath-school in the meetin - 
 house, I don t see why they can t continue," which 
 was very old-fogyish doctrine to the minds of some 
 young people, and particularly to the mind of Mr. 
 Peckham. 
 
 Sometimes the minister had felt himself to be un 
 appreciated and mistaken, because his people balked 
 like unruly horses, and would not follow him in the 
 carrying out of his cherished plans, and so he wel 
 comed this sympathetic and apparently rich stranger 
 with open arms. He could not resist saying that it 
 was sometimes hard for a man who had had a wider 
 
A NEW PARISHIONER. 113 
 
 outlook over the world to suit himself to the limited 
 ideas of a country parish. If the truth were known, 
 he had been born and brought up in much the same 
 sort of a community ; but he had been a fly on the 
 wheel of a large theological school, and imagined 
 himself to be the possessor of a far greater knowl 
 edge of the world and of human nature than is apt 
 to fall to the lot of most men, especially clergymen. 
 It is a strange fact that the training of that profes 
 sion aims so seldom at a practical acquaintance and 
 understanding with the fellow-creatures whom it is 
 empowered to direct and advise. The theories which 
 are laid down in books are often as dangerous for 
 the clergyman to follow as for the physician. 
 
 Mr. Stroud had accepted an invitation to spend 
 a few days at the parsonage, and that evening he 
 opened his heart to the minister in a gratifying way, 
 and spoke freely of his aims and projects. 
 
 " I have been a busy man until this last summer," 
 he said ; " but I have had a serious illness, and my 
 physicians ordered me to free myself from all busi 
 ness cares. As I have told you, I am alone in the 
 world ; and having to leave New Orleans for a colder 
 climate, I did not know at first which way to turn. 
 I have always had an inclination to return to my boy 
 hood s home, if merely to pay a visit to the hills and 
 
114 A NEW PARISHIONER. 
 
 fields, and I must confess that I was quite unpre 
 pared for the affection that overcame me at the sight 
 of the old places and faces. I do not think that I 
 have much time to live, and I have made up my mind 
 to stay here and make it my home for the present, at 
 any rate. I have had an eventful life, arid the re 
 pose of such a place as this is eminently soothing. I 
 am much touched by the interest that my coming 
 seems to have aroused, and I shall take pleasure in 
 trying to prove myself a friend to these good neigh 
 bors, and a worthy member of your church and par 
 ish." 
 
 There was a good deal of dignity about Mr. Stroud, 
 and a deep tone of humility and pathos when he 
 spoke of his loneliness, and of his almost ended life, 
 and his desire to make the most of his last days, 
 which nearly overcame the little minister, arid he 
 grasped his new parishioner s hand. 
 
 " I foresee a strong helper in you, my dear sir," 
 he said softly, " in the good work I am trying to do. 
 I hope you will command my services as pastor and 
 friend." And a league was formed between them. 
 
 As the autumn days went on, Mr. Stroud became 
 a familiar sight, as he drove or walked slowly along 
 the country roads. His expedition with Jonas Phipps 
 
A NEW PARISHIONER. 115 
 
 to the family burying-ground on the old Stroud farm 
 had resulted in his spending much money in the fenc 
 ing and grading of it, and the broken and fallen 
 stones were replaced or put to rights carefully. It 
 happened that the present owners of the farm had 
 built a new house, and were living more comfortably 
 than most people in Walton, and the arrangement 
 was made that Mr. Stroud should go there to board. 
 Mrs. West, the farmer s wife, was much courted and 
 questioned by her acquaintances ; and being a some 
 what sentimental soul, as well as a lover of a good 
 story, she had many an interesting fact to commu 
 nicate. All the neighbors knew how many news 
 papers Mr. Stroud took, and how many letters he 
 had to answer ; what beautiful shirts he wore, and 
 how he gave next to no trouble, and hardly ever 
 could bear to speak of his wife, and that he liked a 
 dinner of boiled fowls better than most anything, and 
 every day went down to the burying lot, as if it were 
 all he had in the world. In society he was a very 
 agreeable man ; he talked well, though he was rather 
 pompous, and it became the fashion to defer to him 
 upon any questions of the outside world s affairs. 
 
 Everybody followed this leader but Miss Lydia 
 Dunn. Strange to say, she liked him less and less ; 
 she was prejudiced to an unwarrantable degree. It 
 
116 A NEW PARISHIONER. 
 
 made no difference to her that he made long and elo 
 quent prayers ; that he was going to give a new li 
 brary to the Sunday-school, and had spoken of her as 
 the proper person to select it in company with the 
 minister. He had called upon her within a week or 
 two of his arrival in town, and from the minute she 
 gave him the first steady look out of her sharp-sighted 
 eyes, and he turned away, a little embarrassed, to ad 
 mire the view from the windows, she would join in 
 none of the praise of him with which the air was 
 filled, and listened to the petty gossip about his acts 
 and affairs with an ill-concealed impatience. She 
 doubted him, she did not know why. She reproached 
 herself, and fought the feeling she had toward him 
 most bitterly at first ; but it was of no use. She 
 feared that the townspeople thought she cherished 
 the old grudge against the name, and hated him for 
 his father s sins ; but dislike and distrust him she cer 
 tainly did, and she could not deceive other people or 
 herself. 
 
 It is unnecessary to say that she was in the minor 
 ity, for all Walton treated him like a king. His 
 money seemed to be at everybody s service, when it 
 suited his pleasure to hear the hints with which his 
 ears were filled. He helped one farmer to lift a 
 mortgage, with which the recklessness of a dissipated 
 
A NEW PARISHIONER. 117 
 
 son had burdened him ; he visited more than one 
 poor old soul, and left a bank-note in her hand when 
 he said good-by. He found a cousin of his mother 
 living alone, very feeble and poor, in a dilapidated 
 house in a distant part of the town ; and he had the 
 house repaired, and hired a strong young woman to 
 take care of things, with the assurance that he would 
 be responsible for all bills. He came forward lib 
 erally with his subscription to every good work that 
 was undertaken, whether religious or secular, and 
 people began to wonder how Walton had ever got on 
 without him. 
 
 The announcement of his crowning piece of gener 
 osity came just before Thanksgiving. Jonas Phipps, 
 whom Miss Lydia Dunn had carefully engaged to 
 come early on the Monday morning to aid her in the 
 severer duties of house-keeping, came loitering down 
 the hill about eleven o clock, as if nobody in the 
 world were in the least hurry. Miss Lydia had been 
 in a blazing rage with him for at least three hours, 
 and received him in ominous silence ; but he sat 
 down, and dropped his hat beside him, and began to 
 rub his lame leg diligently. 
 
 " I do know s I m going to be good for anything 
 this winter," he whined dolefully ; and Miss Dunn 
 snapped him up with exceeding promptness : 
 
118 A NEW PARISHIONER. 
 
 " Folks would be astonished if you was ! " 
 
 " I hoped you would n t lay it up against me for 
 rny being late this morning," he apologized. " I 
 should ha got here before eight, but they hailed me 
 from the parsonage. Mr. Stroud, he was there 
 a ready, and they said they were going to run the 
 lines for the new vestry as soon as the men come 
 from Walpole." 
 
 " What new vestry ? " asked Miss Lydia, coming 
 out from the pantry with a dish in her hand, ready 
 to forget all private grievances in hearing this inter 
 esting news. 
 
 " Then you ain t heard that Mr. Stroud is going to 
 build one ? Well, I was only acquainted with the 
 facts this morning. I found I could be o some use, 
 and I s posed you would n t be very particular about 
 having of me round until you were about through 
 with the washing." 
 
 " Don t you know I never wash the Monday of 
 Thanksgiving week ? " and Miss Dunn stood ready 
 again to fight her own battles. " You know just as 
 well as I do that I wanted you here early, and now 
 I ve been so put back in my work that I m ready to 
 say I don t want you to show yourself inside my 
 doors again. I can t be so bothered and fretted. 
 You re worse than ever you were, and there s no 
 disguising it." 
 
A NEW PARISHIONER. 119 
 
 Jonas gave a heavy sigh. " It s going to be a 
 real ornamental building, I heard some of em say. 
 It 11 set in the far corner of the lot, between them 
 two balm-o -Gilead trees. Mr. Stroud was saying he 
 should have liked to get into it this winter, but win 
 ter plastering is always a-cracking. They re going 
 to haul the stone for the foundation from Beckett s 
 quarry, and they 11 do that right off. They 11 be 
 getting jealous of us over to Raynham. Gives like 
 a prince, don t he ? I tell you, we re awful fortunate 
 to have such a man come amon^ us. Mis Peckham 
 
 o 
 
 was saying yesterday, when I was over to the par 
 sonage, that he d give some kind o a hint to the 
 minister about a new communion service." 
 
 " The old one s good enough," barked Miss Dunn. 
 " I ain t one that wants to do away with all the 
 old associations. And, for my part, I don t like to 
 see anybody too good. My father always used to 
 say, When you see anybody too good, look out for 
 em. I don t know anything against Henry Stroud, 
 but he ain t got the mean Stroud look out of his face, 
 if be has got rich and pious." 
 
 " I thought t was right to go accordin to Scrip- 
 tur ; < By their works ye shall know em, " Jonas 
 suggested with considerable spirit ; but he was doomed 
 to have his loyalty quenched, for Miss Dunn retorted 
 
120 A NEW PARISHIONER. 
 
 that he had better be meditating on that verse for his 
 own good. 
 
 " But I ought to be ashamed of twitting you 
 or throwing disrepute on anybody," said the good 
 woman. " And I tell you honest, Jonas, I wish I 
 had a more Christian feeling about that man. I 
 know folks says it s jealousy, and that I ain t able to 
 forget his father s cheating my grandfather ; but if 
 I d liked him, and believed he was a straightforward 
 man, I never would have thought of keeping any old 
 grievances. There ain t any of us but has lived 
 down some of our old sins we re ashamed to think 
 of now, and it s fair to look at a man as he is, and 
 not go raking up old matters. It seems to me as if 
 he was kind of buying his way into heaven out of 
 his pocket, and as if he liked to be king of his com 
 pany, and the big man of the place, now he s come 
 back to it. I don t like the looks of him ; but as for 
 the good he does, that 11 stay after him." 
 
 " You always do have good judgment," said Jonas. 
 " I can t say I got the measure of him the first time 
 I see him. He had a kind of meaching cast o coun- 
 
 o 
 
 tenance, though you can t tell by the looks of a toad 
 how far he 11 jump. But when you come to see how 
 he spends his money right and left, and the good lie 
 does with it, and hear how he leads in prayer, I don t 
 
A NEW PARISHIONER. 121 
 
 see how anybody can speak agin him. Miss Singer 
 said it fetched the tears right out o her eyes to hear 
 him lamenting his sins as he does in the evening 
 meeting, as if he was the wickedest man there." 
 
 " Perhaps he s only telling the truth," said Miss 
 Dunn, and Jonas rose in indignation. 
 
 " I don t see how you can talk so on-Christian ! " 
 he said. " But there," he added, in a milder tone, 
 " we all have our feelin s about such things, and I 
 do know but what it s as well to be honest about 
 em." Jonas could not help being mindful of Miss 
 Dunn s kindness and generosity and patience, which 
 had lasted year in and year out ; for his slender 
 fortunes would be slenderer still without her assist 
 ance. He and his mother, a very old and almost 
 helpless woman, lived in a house that was one of the 
 most ancient and shiftlessly kept of any in that 
 region, and Jonas hardly ever descended the hill to 
 ward it from Miss Dunn s without some plate or 
 basket of food, or other help to the housekeeping. 
 Beside this lame man and the woman of nearly 
 ninety years, there was a little orphan niece of 
 Jonas s, who was growing up under that cheerless 
 roof. There were so few really poor people in Wal 
 ton that great capital was made of these ; and the 
 sewing society sewed for them, and the church, of 
 
122 A NEW PARISHIONER. 
 
 which old Mrs. Phipps had been a somewhat unsatis 
 factory member, paid their rent, and some bills be 
 side. Miss Dunn did not believe in making depend 
 ents and paupers of them. She insisted that people 
 should work when they could, and be paid for it, and 
 unless Jonas rendered her some service she had noth 
 ing to give him, though he hung round despairingly, 
 and rubbed his knee with no end of devotion and ap 
 parent distraction of pain. 
 
 As the cold weather came on, it was told sadly 
 from one parishioner to another that Mr. Stroud s 
 health was failing, and he really did look feeble and 
 old. The people with whom he made his home gave 
 dismal accounts of his sufferings from bad attacks of 
 pain, and every Sunday, when he took his seat in 
 church, pitying eyes followed him. The stories of 
 his generosities still went on. He met the Phipps 
 child going home from school, one November day, 
 and took her into his wagon and drove her to the 
 Walton store, where he bought her a hood and mit 
 tens, and some cloth for a dress, and a big shawl, 
 which never could be folded small enough for her, or 
 so that the corner of it would not trail on the ground 
 and gather little sticks. He gave the minister an 
 encyclopaedia and a new winter overcoat, and the 
 
A NEW PARISHIONER. 123 
 
 Sunday-school library was promised, and was to be 
 Mr. Stroud s Christmas present to the Sunday-school. 
 The old deacons, who had been for many years chief 
 authorities in parish matters, without whose slow 
 consent nothing had heretofore been done, found 
 themselves ignored and completely set aside. Every 
 thing was to be done as Mr. Stroud and the minister 
 saw fit. The deacons, no doubt, felt a certain sor 
 row at their degradation, but they could only swim 
 with the stream, and express their thankfulness for 
 the zeal of the brother who had come among them. 
 
 o 
 
 Everybody drifted with this current but Miss Dunn, 
 and at last her antagonistic feeling became a cause of 
 great sorrow to her. She searched her heart for the 
 sin of envy and malice, but with all her prayer and 
 penance she could cultivate no better charity toward 
 her neighbor. It was curious that, in spite of wind 
 and rain, the crooked little twig still clung to her 
 kitchen window-sill, and looked in at her every morn 
 ing as she opened the shutter. It seemed as if it 
 held a dwarfed and wretched soul within its ragged 
 bark ; and our friend connected it in her thoughts, 
 she could not tell why, with the stranger and his 
 coming. She felt that she ought to be charitable, 
 and that it was wicked to hate without cause ; but 
 Mr. Stroud was still outside the pale of her affec- 
 
124 A NEW PARISHIONER. 
 
 tions, and the lilac twig that looked like a man still 
 clung outside the window, in the cold. She could 
 not throw it away, but she wished every morning that 
 it might have blown away in the night, and so have 
 freed her from its haunting unpleasantness. She had 
 not believed before that she was superstitious, and al 
 together this was a troubled time in her life ; but the 
 days grew shorter and shorter, the stones for the 
 foundation of the vestry went crawling up the long 
 hill, load after load, and she filled her cellar fuller of 
 provisions than ever, and set her face resolutely to 
 ward getting through another long, hard Walton 
 winter. 
 
 It was curious that Mr. Stroud seemed eager to 
 be friendly with Miss Dunn. He treated her with 
 great respect arid deference, and appeared to take no 
 notice of her abrupt and slighting manner toward 
 him, though many of the lookers-on accused her of 
 disgraceful rudeness. She said to herself many times 
 that she would treat him civilly ; but she did not al 
 ways succeed, and she became conscious that the 
 new parishioner was anxious to gain her good will, 
 in spite of it. His manner toward her was called 
 long-suffering and really Christian by his admirers ; 
 and, if the truth must be told, Miss Dunn became un 
 popular with her neighbors, and felt herself to be 
 
A NEW PARISHIONER. 125 
 
 alone on the losing side, a most unhappy minority of 
 one. She would not have believed that some of the 
 people who had always been her friends could have 
 thrown off the old ties so easily ; and it hurt her pride 
 not a little, for she had always been a person of great 
 consequence and influence, and had been faithful and 
 dutiful to the very utmost. She was often slighted 
 and set aside, in these autumn days, and her opinions 
 were seldom sought or listened to. She would have 
 been more than human if she had not remembered 
 how well she had served her towns-folk in their hours 
 of need, and had carried a kind heart and ready hand 
 to help in their days of pleasuring, year after year. 
 She felt very sorry when the thought came to her 
 that her friends were suspecting her of jealousy. 
 
 Mr. Stroud had been very friendly and talkative 
 when he had called upon Miss Dunn, soon after he 
 came to Walton, and she had received him with more 
 show of interest than she was able to muster after 
 ward. He did not repeat the visit until one after 
 noon in the middle of December, when, with much 
 surprise, she saw him drive up to the fence, and after 
 fastening his horse, cover him up carefully, as if 
 he meant to make a long call. Luckily the sitting- 
 room was well warmed already from the kitchen, and 
 Miss Lydia had time to touch a match to -the pine- 
 
126 A NEW PARISHIONER. 
 
 cone kindlings of the fire that was laid in the Franklin 
 
 o 
 
 stove ; and by the time she had somewhat stiffly 
 ushered in her guest, he could have thought the fire 
 was already half an hour old. 
 
 They talked about the weather, and how the snow 
 kept off, and about an old person in the neighborhood 
 who was near death, and with whom Miss Dunn had 
 been watching ; and at last there fell an awkward 
 silence, and the longer it continued the harder it be- 
 
 O 
 
 came to say anything. 
 
 " I have been much pained at discovering that my 
 father was much in fault toward your family," said 
 Mr. Stroud at last, with a good deal of effort. " I 
 wish I had known it sooner ; but you will easily un 
 derstand that, leaving home early in life as I did, and 
 forming new associations, I knew nothing of it. I 
 am anxious now to make restitution. I should have 
 done so years ago if I had known. I cannot say how 
 deeply I regret the disgrace " and the visitor looked 
 pained and troubled ; and as he seemed to feel so 
 keenly the shadow that rested on his name, Miss 
 Dunn s kind heart came to his rescue. 
 
 " I should let bygones be bygones, if I was you," 
 she said. " And your mother, you know, was a most 
 excellent woman ; as good a neighbor as there was in 
 Walton. Yes, your father got my grandfather to 
 
A NEW PARISHIONER. 127 
 
 sign for him, and made promises to him that he knew 
 was lies. It was very hard on the poor old gentle 
 man, but I don t put it down against you, and I don t 
 want you to think there s any account between us. 
 I ve got enough to carry me through unless some 
 thing extra should happen. You Ve been doing for 
 the good of the parish, and so we 11 say no more 
 about it." 
 
 But Mr. Stroud met this generous speech gener 
 ous in other ways than in its refusal of the payment 
 of a debt in a cold-hearted way. 
 
 " You are very kind," he said, " but I shall insist 
 upon paying you the amount of the principal, the 
 original sum that your grandfather lost. I should be 
 glad to include the interest also, but I fear, I am not 
 able at this time, without impairing some good work 
 that I have hoped to do " he was about to add 
 " in other directions," but checked himself in time. 
 " I will make restitution to you so far as I can," and 
 the visitor leaned his head on his hand, and gave a 
 heavy sigh. It was very still in the little sitting- 
 room ; the fire had passed the ardor of its youth, and 
 the pine-cones and crow-sticks having snapped and 
 crackled away up the chimney, the sound walnut and 
 maple sticks were now burning lazily but steadily. 
 The picture of old Parson Dunn looked down sol- 
 
128 A NEW PARISHIONER. 
 
 emuly from the wall, and for a minute his grand 
 daughter felt inadequate to the occasion. 
 
 " If it is to satisfy your own feelings and con 
 science," she said at last, " I shall put no bar in your 
 way ; but I see no use in it and no need of it. I 
 will tell people that you offered to do it, and that I 
 refused to take it, and " 
 
 " I care nothing for the praise of men." The guest 
 flushed, and was somewhat nettled at this, and Miss 
 Lydia felt that she had spoken unkindly in her frank 
 ness. She did not know how to soften her speech, 
 and said nothing ; wishing more and more that Mr. 
 Stroud would end this quixotic business call, and go 
 away. 
 
 She took a good look at him, and was shocked to 
 see how much he was changed and how ill he looked. 
 Her long experience in taking care of sick people had 
 made her eyes quick to see the signs of disease, and 
 she felt a thrill of pity for him and shame for her 
 own uncharitableness, and spoke again, more kindly 
 than before : 
 
 " I want you should let bygones be bygones, Mr. 
 Stroud." 
 
 " You are most considerate," he answered ; " but I 
 came prepared to give you my note for the six thou 
 sand dollars, with six per cent, interest from date. 
 
A NEW PARISHIONER. 129 
 
 If I am living, I will pay it within a year ; if not, 
 you will look to my executors ; " and with a most 
 impressive and solemn manner he drew a folded 
 paper from his pocket. Miss Dunn looked at him 
 and looked at the paper ; she did not know whether 
 to laugh or cry. 
 
 She urged him to stay to tea, when, after a few 
 minutes, he rose from his chair and made ready to 
 go. He looked about the room, and appeared to be 
 struck by its old-fashioned comfort and warm, plain 
 snugness. " You have a most enviable home," he 
 said, in a way that instantly suggested his being only 
 a boarder in Walton, and a sick man at that. Miss 
 Dunn stood by the kitchen window, and watched him 
 climb, with a good deal of effort, into his carriage, 
 and afterward watched the wagon far down the hill 
 and out of sight. Then she sat down, and looked at 
 the note which she been holding fast in her hand. 
 " Lord forgive me for my wickedness," she said, " but 
 I can t like that man, and I never want to touch 
 his money." She went into the front room, and laid 
 the bit of paper on the table, and sat down again and 
 looked at it. " He lied when he said he did n t 
 know about it," she told herself indignantly. " He 
 was a boy of sixteen or seventeen when it happened, 
 and nobody talked of anything else." But she 
 9 
 
130 A NEW PARISHIONER. 
 
 thought for the hundredth time that if he were a 
 cheat, somebody ought to have distrusted him beside 
 herself ; and after all, what had he done but good 
 since he came to Walton ? 
 
 For the next day or two it must be confessed that 
 Miss Dunn s heart was greatly softened toward the 
 new parishioner. She thought of him a great deal, 
 as she went about her work, and she kept herself 
 awake nearly the whole of one night, a thing 
 which seldom happened in connection with her own 
 affairs, though she had lost many a night s rest in the 
 interest of other people. She said to herself over 
 over and again that she had no right to sit in judg 
 ment, and that she was simply finding fault with the 
 man for being himself and doing things in his own 
 way. " I might as well blame the cat because she 
 is n t a dog," she told herself. " I ought to wait, any 
 way, until Henry Stroud does one piece of mischief 
 here in Walton." And little by little, in spite of her 
 instinct, which continued its quiet warning, she per 
 suaded herself first into toleration, and then into pity 
 and interest. For would not she be very well off 
 as to money, since this late repayment of a debt 
 had changed her carefully managed provision into a 
 comfortable property, and was not Henry Stroud the 
 cause of the difference ? She had been richer than 
 
A NEW PARISHIONER. 131 
 
 many of her neighbors, but she had often been anx 
 ious lest the end of the year might find her in debt ; 
 and the off-years of the apple orchard, and the drought 
 that lessened her hay-crop, forced her to self-denials 
 and economies most trying to her generous nature. 
 Then the thought of the man s illness and failing 
 health would haunt her, and she wished she had a 
 chance to suggest some simple remedies that would 
 be likely to make him more comfortable. His loneli 
 ness appealed to her sympathy, for she knew the 
 hardships of it only too well, though the fact re 
 mained that nothing had ever tempted her to invite 
 another solitary woman to share her home. 
 
 On the second day, while the note still lay un 
 touched on the sitting-room table, and when she felt 
 more shaken and tired than was usual with her, even 
 at her busiest seasons, she stood late in the morning 
 at the kitchen door. The day was uncommonly mild 
 for the season, and the house had seemed a little 
 lonely. For a wonder, none of the neighbors had 
 been in ; not even Jonas Phipps had strayed along ; 
 and she had not spoken to any one all the day be 
 fore ; indeed, since she had parted from Mr. Stroud 
 himself. She leaned against the door, and looked up 
 and down the road. She would really have liked to 
 see somebody coming, with whom she could exchange 
 
132 A NEW PARISHIONER. 
 
 greetings ; but nobody was in sight, up the hill or 
 down, and she gave a little sigh, and then bestowed 
 her attention upon the bits of leaves and little sticks 
 that the wind of the night before had swept off the 
 grass to the flagstones, and had piled against the door 
 step. She thought it looked untidy, and briskly went 
 in again to get her broom with which to set the dis 
 orders to rights. It was time to take something out 
 of the oven, and this made a little delay ; and when 
 she returned to the outer world she saw a wagon 
 approaching, and saw also that its driver was Mr. 
 Stroud. 
 
 Her first impulse was to dart back into the kitchen, 
 but it was quite too late for that, and she returned 
 the salutation with considerable friendliness. Mr. 
 Stroud half checked his horse, and there was a mo 
 ment of awkwardness, which Miss Dunn ended by 
 speaking in flattering terms of the weather. 
 
 " Won t you get out and come in ? " she asked, be 
 ing possessed by a sense of great obligation ; and 
 added, " I ve just taken a pan of gingerbread out of 
 the oven ; perhaps you would relish a piece. It s 
 what my grandmother used to call betwixt hay and 
 grass, as to dinner and breakfast." 
 
 Mr. Stroud seemed pleased by this unwonted show 
 of hospitality, and turned his horse toward the hitch- 
 
A NEW PARISHIONER. 133 
 
 ing-post at once, while his hostess heart misgave her 
 at the thought of her fireless sitting-room, and the lit 
 ter of pans and dishes that possessed the kitchen 
 table. But her guest appeared unconscious of any 
 lack of dignity in his reception, and took the rocking- 
 chair by the front window, and proceeded to eat two 
 large pieces of the hot gingerbread, which must have 
 seriously impaired his appetite for dinner. He looked 
 entirely out of place in the kitchen, however, and 
 made Miss Dunn somewhat uncomfortable ; it would 
 have suited her much better if she could have asked 
 him into the sitting-room, but, contrary to her usual 
 custom, she had kept the door shut all the morn 
 ing. 
 
 They talked about nothing that was very interest 
 ing, with a good deal of earnestness. Miss Dunn 
 had a little feeling of embarrassment, which was 
 doubled when Mr. Stroud, after having declined 
 further supplies of gingerbread, said in a pointed 
 way, " I have enjoyed thinking of my visit here the 
 day before yesterday." 
 
 " 1 m sure I was pleased to see you," untruthfully 
 responded Miss Lydia. 
 
 " I think you have a very pleasant home ; it is a 
 thing for which we cannot be too grateful to a kind 
 Providence," and he sighed heavily. 
 
134 A NEW PARISHIONER. 
 
 Miss Dunn had been afraid that he would make 
 some allusion to the note for six thousand dollars, 
 and showed her gratitude at being spared that by say 
 ing, " -How is your health, Mr. Stroud ? Seems to 
 me you have picked up a little." 
 
 But Mr. Stroud sighed again, and shook his head 
 oadly. " I don t seem to have gained," he said. 
 
 " I know of some excellent teas for your com 
 plaints," she suggested. " Folks laugh nowadays at 
 some o the old-fashioned remedies, but I must say I 
 like em as well as any. I don t think they ? ve had 
 their day yet." 
 
 " I should be very grateful for help," said the 
 guest, " and I wish I could thank you for your sym 
 pathy ; " and he gave her a look that said so much 
 that it set Miss Lydia s heart into a great flutter ; but 
 the next minute she flushed, and was angry with her 
 self for being such a fool, and the old feeling of dis 
 like and distrust crept over her, surely and suddenly. 
 
 If Jonas Phipps had been the angel Gabriel, she 
 could not have been more grateful to him for his 
 friendship and assistance in paying her a morning 
 visit at that particular moment, and she offered him 
 the plate of gingerbread with a feeling of real affec 
 tion. 
 
 Jonas selected the largest piece, and disappeared 
 
A NEW PARISHIONER. 135 
 
 through the woodshed door, by which he had entered ; 
 and Mr. Stroud also took his departure, after making 
 some further expressions of his gratitude. Miss 
 Dunn s brain was in a whirl, but she sought Jonas, 
 and offered him rebuke after rebuke, until he left 
 some long-neglected wood-splitting in self-defense, 
 and went limping away with a piece of board and 
 two stakes and the axe, to mend a broken place in 
 the far corner of the orchard fence ; and there he 
 dwelt in unmolested safety until dinner-time. 
 
 That afternoon Miss Dunn went out on an errand 
 of mercy to an invalid neighbor, who lived a mile or 
 two away, and did not allow herself to think about 
 her own affairs in peace until she sat down alone, 
 after supper. Then there was nothing else to be 
 done, and she began to feel very much upset. There 
 was an unmistakable meaning and intention quite 
 separate from any words that Mr. Stroud had said 
 to her that morning, and she was both angry and 
 pleased together. She could not fight down the cer 
 tainty that she was no longer young, and that she 
 was quite alone in the world ; that it would be a 
 blessed thing to have some one near her who loved 
 her dearly and would take care of her. It would 
 make life a great deal more interesting if she were 
 doing her round of every-day work for somebody 
 
136 A NEW PARISHIONER. 
 
 else s sake, as well as her own. It would be a great 
 victory won from certain members of the parish, also 
 single women, if she became the wife of Mr. Stroud ; 
 and she was not without ambition. But, on the 
 other hand, though he was the greatest man in Wal 
 ton, he was still a Stroud ; and she smiled grimly as 
 she thought that some of her own ancestors would be 
 disturbed in their graves at the thought of her marry 
 ing one of that family. And it was a doubtful ques 
 tion whether she was wise in undertaking the care of 
 a sick man ; for, in spite of her skill in nursing, he 
 might not be going to spend much more time in this 
 world. At last she rose impatiently, and marched 
 off to bed, and said to herself the last thing before 
 she went to sleep, " I guess I d better wait until I ve 
 heard more about it, before I begin to worry myself ; 
 but he need n t think I m going to run after him the 
 way some folks have." 
 
 She was almost ashamed when she found herself 
 thinking about the new parishioner the first thing in 
 the morning, and called herself an old fool ; but there 
 was, after all, satisfaction in the thought of his ad 
 miration of her gingerbread, and she recalled some 
 ignominious failure that Mrs. West, his present host 
 ess, had made in the cake line at a parish supper, not 
 long before, and she wondered if the poor man were 
 
A NEW PARISHIONER. 137 
 
 often treated to such cooking as that. She went into 
 the front room and took up the bit of paper which 
 he had given her, and smoothed it out, and looked at 
 the clerkish, regular writing with interest. " I dare 
 say he would have to go to New York and round on 
 business," she told herself, and then thought with 
 awe and satisfaction of his wealth. " I always did 
 think I should like traveling," she said ; and then 
 was so angry with herself, that if Jonas had appeared 
 at that moment it would have fared cruelly hard with 
 him. 
 
 But a little later in the day the tide of her feeling 
 turned, for Jonas came bravely in to offer his con 
 gratulations for her good fortune. Miss Dunn had 
 not spoken of Mr. Stroud s repayment of .the old 
 debt to any one. She had known that it would be 
 right and just, and had been girding up her strength 
 to the fray. Somebody else had been before her, 
 and it must have been none other than her benefactor 
 himself. It will easily be imagined how the story of 
 this great piece of generosity flew from house to 
 house, and Jonas said that everybody knew of it all 
 over town, in answer to Miss Lydia s startled in 
 quiry. This spoiled everything, and the new growth 
 of interest was crushed, and the world was seen to 
 be the same world as before, only more in shadow 
 
138 A NEW PARISHIONER. 
 
 than ever, while our friend hardly knew why she was 
 so provoked and disappointed. She said to herself 
 that it was no use to go against your nature, and she 
 knew what sort of a man he was the first time she 
 set eyes on him ; if other folks did n t, the worst was 
 their own. But she went about the house drearily, 
 and Jonas, who was promptly dismissed, though he 
 was sure she wished him to fill a certain water hogs 
 head from the orchard spring, reported at the next 
 neighbor s that Miss Lyddy was taking her prosperity 
 dreadful hard. For his part, he wondered whether 
 she was kind of mortified, or whether she was scared 
 to stay alone with so much money in the house. 
 
 It was a great relief on the next day, which was 
 Sunday, that there was so deep a fall of snow that 
 even so constant and devoted a church-goer as our 
 
 c3 
 
 heroine was obliged to stay at home. Though she 
 was glad of this excuse from facing her accusing 
 neighbors, they felt it to be a loss of entertainment ; 
 and perhaps it was for the satisfaction of these de 
 ferred hopes of seeing her come into church that the 
 Wednesday evening meeting was uncommonly well 
 attended. It was a clear, bright night, and the Sun 
 day s snow was trodden into capital sleighing, and as 
 good walking as can ever be in country roads. It 
 was a long while since the moon had had to light so 
 
^A NEW PARISHIONER. 139 
 
 many Walton people to the Wednesday meeting, and 
 it was for anything but to say their prayers together. 
 The new parishioner sat in his accustomed seat 
 near the pulpit, and Miss Dunn sat in her old family 
 pew, which was on the side and faced the congrega 
 tion. She would not have sat anywhere else for un 
 told ^old. and she made so much effort to look un- 
 
 O 7 
 
 concerned that her cheeks were red with excitement, 
 and her hands shook when she held the hymn-book. 
 Mr. Peckham spoke with great feeling of his pleas 
 ure at meeting so large a congregation, and Mr. 
 Stroud prayed, and two women made an ostentatious 
 use of their pocket-handkerchiefs for several minutes 
 afterward. The old deacons followed in their turn, 
 the hymns were sung, and the meeting was possessed 
 of a good deal more fervor than usual. Mr. Peck- 
 ham had read a few verses from the book of the Rev 
 elation, and was explaining them earnestly. Miss 
 Dunn had felt as if this meeting were to be in some 
 
 o 
 
 way personal and condemnatory of herself ; but as 
 the hour went on she quite recovered her self-posses 
 sion, and the horrors of her position as regarded 
 Walton society became much less. 
 
 At the last of the evening, while Mr. Stroud him 
 self was speaking, she heard the door of the church 
 open, and looking around she saw two men come 
 
140 A NEW PARISHIONER. 
 
 quickly in and seat themselves in the pew nearest 
 the door. From her own pew at the side of the 
 church she could look up and down the aisle, and she 
 saw these strangers give a little nod at each other, 
 and look amused as they listened to the speaker. 
 She loitered in her pew for a few minutes after the 
 meeting was over, as was her habit, and spoke to one 
 and another of her friends as usual. She had a great 
 anxiety riot to do anything uncommon, and when she 
 was half-way down the aisle she felt herself to have 
 regained her equilibrium. Old Mrs. Bangs, who was 
 waiting by the stove for the deacon to get his horse 
 ready, and bring him round from the rail to the 
 church door, caught at her sleeve as she went by, 
 and after speaking about the meeting and some gen 
 eral matters added bluntly, " Well Lyddy, you can t 
 say anything against Mr. Stroud, now. I m sure he 
 has done handsome by you." 
 
 u I Ve never meant to say anything against him," 
 answered Miss Dunn ; " but I think he was foolish 
 to do what he has. I tried to persuade him out of 
 it, I m sure." And just at this moment Mr. Stroud 
 and the minister came by, when Miss Dunn, who had 
 for a few moments forgotten the two strangers, no 
 ticed with surprise that they were still in the pew 
 next the door. 
 
A NEW PARISHIONER. 141 
 
 One of them stepped forward aiid spoke to Mr. 
 Stroud, who looked disturbed and shocked. He 
 leaned back against the wall, and acted as if he were 
 much in despair. The two men watched him, and 
 seemed to be waiting, and it was only a minute be 
 fore he turned to Mr. Peckham, and said, Miss 
 Dunn being so near that she heard every word, 
 " I find I must take a long, cold journey to-night 
 My presence is needed in New York, and I must go 
 at once to catch the train at Walpole." 
 
 Mr. Peckham expressed his sorrow for this, his 
 friend being so feeble and sensitive to cold. He said 
 a good deal in trying to urge him to wait until morn 
 ing ; but after one look at the grim messengers, Mr. 
 Stroud politely waived the arguments, and buttoned 
 up his overcoat and went out into the moonlight 
 night. One of the strangers got into the sleigh with 
 him, and the other followed alone ; and that was the 
 last that was seen of the New Parishioner, and the 
 last of his illustrious reign in Walton. 
 
 " My conscience ! " said Jonas Phipps, one day 
 early in the spring, when he made his first appear 
 ance at Miss Dunn s after a long illness. " How 
 come you to see through that cheat, when all the rest 
 of us was so taken in ? I don t know s Mr. Peck- 
 
142 A NEW PARISHIONER. 
 
 ham is ever going to git over it. We all took him 
 to be spending money by the fistful, and most of it 
 was nothing but givin his note and saying i Charge 
 it to me, as if he was the great Lord Gull. Nobody 
 had any kind of doubt but what his pockets was lined 
 with money. Not but what it wa n t a kind of dread 
 ful thing that he should ha died all alone in his bed 
 over there to Walpole. I s pose t was that long 
 ride in the cold and his being upset by the officers 
 pouncing on to him so, right in the meeting-house. 
 He did spend some honest money though : I can 
 think o four or five hundred dollars he left in one 
 place and another whilst he was here." 
 
 Miss Dunn said nothing, and after reflecting a 
 while Jonas went on : 
 
 "He was gifted in prayer more than most, now, 
 was n t he ? I think, being a sick man, and knowing 
 it, after he defaulted down South there, he thought 
 he would be as religious as he could while he had 
 time. He must have felt as safe here as anywhere. 
 They pronounced his name different down South, you 
 know. Strude they called it ; and somebody was 
 telling me folks thought it was likely he d been go 
 ing under another name, any way. Land ! there s 
 all that foundation stone for the vestry laying up 
 there on the meetin house yard. I wonder when 
 
A NEW PARISHIONER. 143 
 
 they re going to raise. And the parish s got to pay 
 for that new library he gave it for a Christmas pres 
 ent. Eun an awful rig, did n t he ? I was surprised 
 when they told me his wife had left him, stead of her 
 being dead, as we thought all along. I Ve sometimes 
 thought he was a little sprung. How he did strut 
 about, and all the women made everything of him 
 but you," said Jonas, trying to turn a pretty compli 
 ment to Miss Dunn s discretion. " I wonder who 
 paid the bills for his funeral ? Nobody seemed to 
 know at the time." 
 
 " It was just as well if they did n t," said Lydia 
 Dunn, looking a little conscious. " Now, Jonas 
 Phipps, we ve both got work to do, and lives to live, 
 and that poor creature s gone to his last account ; 
 we have n t any business with him, as I know of. 
 He could n t help being a Stroud, and the sins he 
 could help he s had a chance to be ashamed of be 
 fore this. For my part, I don t want to hear another 
 thing about him. But I do thank my stars I never 
 made a fool of myself, and I wish others, for their 
 sakes, could say as much. I guess I had trouble o 
 mind enough to last me one while. I don t know as 
 some folks knows what honesty is : you might as well 
 blame a black and white cat for not being a good 
 mouser." 
 
144 A NEW PARISHIONER. 
 
 u How s that little gray cat turned out, you started 
 to raise along in the winter ? " interrupted Jonas, 
 earnestly ; and Miss Dunn replied, not without a 
 smile, that she seemed to be a likely kitten. 
 
 " Any way, folks thinks a sight of your opinion," 
 said Jonas again. " And mother, she sticks to it 
 you did me a sight more good than the doctor. She 
 says I never should ha pulled through if it had n t 
 "been for the time you spent a-watching of me, and 
 them things you recommended. I guess everybody 
 has to allow that in the long run you ve done more 
 good than Stroud," and grateful Mr. Phipps rubbed 
 his eyes with his coat sleeve. " I told the minister 
 so last time he come to see me. Rising sixty year, 
 says I, she s been doing of good works ! But at 
 this Miss Lydia looked displeased. " He s dreadful 
 ashamed, now, about having took up with Stroud so. 
 4 Talk s cheap, says I to Mr. Peckham, and Stroud 
 was great on talk. " 
 
 " Now, Jonas Phipps," said Miss Lydia, " there 
 was nobody who kept round Henry Stroud any closer 
 than you did. You always were telling me how rich 
 he was, and how much he gave away, and every 
 thing he d been doing, and what an addition he was 
 to the place." 
 
 " It did look like it for a time," said Jonas, humbly. 
 
A NEW PARISHIONER. 145 
 
 u Even you would ha liked him if you could, but 
 your good judgment would n t allow. Seems dread 
 ful dull since I got about again, not hearing anything 
 about his goin s-on. Asa Singer was telling of me, 
 as I come up the hill, he called me in to get me 
 to try a bar l of cider they d just tapped for spring 
 use, he said there wa n t an apple in it but what was 
 sound, and it did go to the right spot, I tell ye, 
 Asa was telling of me that a bill come from some- 
 
 o 
 
 wheres South only yesterday. I wonder what he d 
 V done if he had n t died ; they all say he had n t 
 much money by him." 
 
 Miss Dunn felt a sense of nearness to the edge of 
 a precipice. She often remembered, in these days, 
 that she had taken at least one step in a most dan 
 gerous direction. She had called herself names all 
 winter long, and felt like a hypocrite when people 
 complimented her on her superior discretion. It is 
 a most humiliating thing to lose one s self-respect, 
 and she never could forget that for a few hours she 
 had been in peril of defeat, and of being bought over, 
 like the rest. She had allowed herself to glance at 
 the temptation, and she could make no excuse for 
 herself. The Lord had made her a woman, to be 
 sure, but she need not have been a silly one. 
 
 Jonas went on with his reflections : " I can t be- 
 10 
 
146 A NEW PARISHIONER. 
 
 lieve but what he d done better if he d had a longer 
 chance. He was a great hand for a meeting, and he 
 seemed to want to do well by everybody ; but they 
 say he d had to clear out from three or four places 
 running, and some thinks he may have got the money 
 he spent here by gambling." 
 
 " It s no kind of use to make a man out worse 
 than he is," said Miss Dunn, angrily, u and for my 
 part I am sick to death of hearing about Henry 
 Stroud. I hoped it had blown over a little, but I 
 suppose it s natural you should want to take your 
 turn at it. First, folks was all pecking at me be 
 cause I would n t bow down and worship him, and 
 now they want me to throw rocks at his tomb-stone. 
 They go just like a pack of sheep over a stone wall ; 
 one gets her nose over, and all the rest think they ve 
 got to die if they don t follow. He s gone to his last 
 account, and we d better let him alone." 
 
 It was easy enough to say this, but the subject con 
 tinued to be an interesting one, and provoked fre 
 quent discussions for many months afterward, in that 
 neighborhood. It was some time before the resi- 
 
 o 
 
 dents of surrounding towns could resist asking such 
 Walton people as ventured to stray away from home 
 what had become of the great man they used to have 
 over there, or if they had moved into the new vestry 
 yet. 
 
A NEW PARISHIONER. 147 
 
 As for the twig at the window, the outer blind got 
 loose one windy winter night, and struck against it 
 and set it free, and it was blown along the frozen 
 snow far down the hill and out of sight ; and in the 
 morning Miss Dunn felt lighter-hearted, because she 
 missed it from its place. It seemed to her that she 
 was growing old and notional. She had felt as young 
 as ever until that winter, for her girlhood had been 
 a dutiful and quiet one. It was fortunate that she 
 found so much to do inside her house and out, and 
 everybody said that her front yard was the hand 
 somest in Walton that summer ; the flowers bloomed 
 in great splendor, and her two best china vases from 
 the parlor mantel-piece were filled for the adornment 
 of the pulpit Sunday after Sunday. Even Jonas 
 Phipps did not suspect, as he toiled in her company, 
 that sad thoughts often assailed her, and could not be 
 driven away either by a double diligence in her soli 
 tary housekeeping, or by her painstaking care that 
 the garden pinks and lilies should be untroubled by 
 weeds. 
 
AN ONLY SON. 
 
 IT was growing more and more uncomfortable in 
 the room where Deacon Price had spent the greater 
 part of a hot July morning. The sun did not shine 
 in, for it was now directly overhead, but the glare of 
 its reflection from the dusty village street and the 
 white house opposite was blinding to the eyes. At 
 least one of the three selectmen of Dalton, who were 
 assembled in solemn conclave, looked up several times 
 at the tops of the windows, and thought they had 
 better see about getting some curtains. 
 
 There was more business than usual, but most of 
 it belonged to the familiar detail of the office ; there 
 were bills to pay for the support of the town s-poor 
 and the district schools, and afterward some discus 
 sion arose about a new piece of road which had been 
 projected by a few citizens, who were as violently op 
 posed by others. The selectmen were agreed upon 
 this question, but they proposed to speak in private 
 with the county commissioners, who were expected to 
 
AN ONLY SON. 149 
 
 view the region of the new highway the next week. 
 This, however, had been well canvassed at their last 
 meeting, and they had reached no new conclusions 
 since ; so presently the conversation flagged a little, 
 and Deacon Price drummed upon the ink-spattered 
 table with his long, brown fingers, and John Kendall 
 the grist-miller rose impatiently and went to the small 
 window, where he stood with blinking eyes looking 
 down into the street. His well-rounded figure made a 
 
 o 
 
 pleasant shadow in that part of the room, but it 
 seemed to grow hotter every moment. Captain Abel 
 Stone left his chair impatiently, and taking his hat 
 went down the short flight of stairs that led to the 
 street, knocking his thick shuffling boots clumsily by 
 the way. He reached the sidewalk, and looked up 
 and down the street, but nobody was coming ; so he 
 turned to Asa Ball the shoemaker, who was standing 
 in his shop-door. 
 
 " Business is n t brisk, I take it ? " inquired the cap 
 tain ; and Mr. Ball replied that he did n t do much 
 more than tend shop, nowadays. Folks would keep 
 on buying cheap shoes, and thinking they saved more 
 money on two pair a year for five dollars than when 
 he used to make em one pair for four. " But I make 
 better pay than I used to working at my trade, and 
 so I ain t going to fret," said Asa shrewdly, with a 
 
150 AN ONLY SON. 
 
 significant glance at a modest pile of empty cloth- 
 boot boxes ; and the captain laughed a little, and took 
 a nibble at a piece of tobacco which he had found 
 with much difficulty in one of his deep coat pockets. 
 He had followed the sea in his early life, but had re 
 turned to the small, stony farm which had been the 
 home of his childhood, perhaps fifteen years before 
 this story begins. He had taken as kindly to inland 
 life as if he had never been even spattered with sea 
 water, and had been instantly given the position in 
 town affairs which his wealth and character merited. 
 He still retained a good deal of his nautical way of 
 looking at things. One would say that to judge by 
 his appearance he had been well rubbed with tar and 
 salt, and it was supposed by his neighbors that his old 
 sea-chests were guardians of much money ; he was 
 overrated by some of them as being worth fifteen 
 thousand dollars with the farm thrown in. He was 
 considered very peculiar, because he liked to live in 
 the somewhat dilapidated little farmhouse, and some 
 of his attempts at cultivating the sterile soil were the 
 occasion of much amusement. He had made a large 
 scrap-book, during his long sea-voyages, of all sorts 
 of hints and suggestions for the tillage of the ground, 
 gleaned from books and newspapers and almanacs, 
 and nobody knows where else. He had pasted these 
 
AN ONLY SON. 151 
 
 in, or copied them in his stiff, careful handwriting, 
 and had pleased himself by watching his collection 
 grow while he was looking forward through the long, 
 storm-tossed years to his quiet anchorage among the 
 Dalton hills. He was a single man, and though a 
 braver never had trod the quarter-deck, from motives 
 of wisest policy he seldom opposed his will to that of 
 Widow Martha Hawkes, who had consented to do 
 him the great favor of keeping his house. 
 
 " Havin a long session to-day, seems to me," ob 
 served the shoemaker, with little appearance of the 
 curiosity which he really felt. 
 
 " There was a good many p ints to be looked over," 
 answered Captain Stone, becoming aware that he had 
 secrets to guard, and looking impenetrable and un 
 concerned. " It s worked into a long drought, just 
 as I said I never took note of a drier sky ; don t 
 seem now as if we ever should get a sprinkle out of 
 it, but I suppose we shall ; " and he turned with a 
 sigh to the door, and disappeared again up the narrow 
 
 I stairway. The three horses which were tied to ad 
 jacent posts in the full blaze of the sun all hung their 
 
 r ancient heads wearily, and solaced their disappoint 
 ment as best they might. They had felt certain, 
 when the captain appeared, that the selectmen s meet 
 ing was over. If they had been better acquainted 
 
152 AN ONLY SON. 
 
 with politics they might have wished that there could 
 be a rising of the opposition, so that their masters 
 would go out of office for as many years as they had 
 come in. 
 
 The captain s companions looked up at him ea 
 gerly, as if they were sure that he was the herald of 
 the expected tax-collector, who was to pay a large 
 sum of money to them, of which the town treasury 
 was in need. It was close upon twelve o clock, and 
 only a very great emergency would detain them be 
 yond that time. They were growing very hungry ? 
 and when the captain, after a grave shake of his 
 head, had settled into his chair again, they all felt 
 more or less revengeful, though Deacon Price showed 
 it by looking sad. One would have thought that he 
 was waiting with reluctance to see some punishment 
 descend upon the head of the delaying official. 
 
 " Well, Mis Hawkes will be waiting for me, and 
 she never likes that," said Captain Stone at last ; and 
 just at that minute was heard the sound of wheels. 
 
 " Perhaps it s my mare stepping about, she s 
 dreadful restive .in fly- time," suggested Mr. Kendall, 
 and at once put his head out of the window ; but 
 when he took it in again, it was to tell his fellow-of 
 ficers that Jackson was coming, and then they all sat 
 solemnly in their chairs, with as much dignity as the 
 
AN ONLY SON. 153 
 
 situation of things allowed. Their judicial and gov 
 ernmental authority was plainly depicted in their ex 
 pression. On ordinary occasions they were not re 
 markable, except as excellent old-fashioned country 
 men ; but when they represented to the world the 
 personality and character of the town of Dalton, they 
 would not have looked out of place seated in that 
 stately company which Carpaccio has painted in the 
 Reception of the English Ambassadors. It was Dai- 
 ton that was to give audience that summer day, in the 
 dusty, bare room, as Venice listens soberly in the pic 
 ture. 
 
 They heard a man speak to his horse and leap to 
 the ground heavily, and then listened eagerly to the 
 clicks and fumbling which represented the tying of 
 the halter, and then there were sounds of steps upon 
 the stairway. The voice of Mr. Ball was heard, but 
 it did not seem to have attracted much attention, and 
 presently the long-waited-for messenger was in the 
 room. He was dusty and sun-burnt, and looked good- 
 naturedly at his hosts. They greeted him amiably 
 enough, and after he had put his worn red handker 
 chief away he took a leather wallet from his pocket, 
 and looking at a little roll of bills almost reluctantly, 
 turned them over with lingering fingers and passed 
 them to Mr. Kendall, who sat nearest him, saying 
 that he believed it was just right. 
 
154 AN ONLY SON. 
 
 There was little else, said, and after the money had 
 again been counted the meeting was over. There had 
 indeed been a hurried arrangement as to who should 
 guard the treasury, but when Deacon Price had ac 
 knowledged that he meant to go to South Dalton next 
 morning, he was at once deputed to carry the remit 
 tance to the bank there, where the town s funds 
 and many of its papers already reposed. The deacon 
 said slowly that he did n t know as he cared about 
 keeping so much money in the house, but he was not 
 relieved by either of his colleagues, and so these hon 
 est men separated and returned to private life again. 
 Their homes were at some distance from each other ; 
 but for a half mile or so Deacon Price followed Cap 
 tain Stone, and a cloud of dust followed them both. 
 Then the captain turned to the left, up toward the 
 hills ; but Deacon Price kept on for some distance 
 through the level lands, and at last went down a long 
 lane, unshaded except here and there where some am 
 bitious fence stakes had succeeded in changing them 
 selves into slender willow-trees. In the spring the 
 sides of the lane had been wet, and were full of 
 green things, growing as fast as they could ; but now 
 these had been for some time dried up. The lane 
 was bordered with dusty mayweed, and three deep 
 furrows were worn through the turf, where the 
 
AN ONLY SON. 155 
 
 wagon wheels and the horse s patient feet had trav 
 eled back and forward so many years. The house 
 stood at the end, looking toward the main road as if 
 it wished it were there ; it was a low-storied white 
 house, with faded green blinds. 
 
 The deacon had tried to hurry his slow horse still 
 more after he caught sight of another horse and 
 wagon standing in the wide dooryard. He had en 
 tirely forgotten until that moment that his niece and 
 housekeeper, Eliza Storrow, had made a final an 
 nouncement in the morning that she was going to 
 start early that afternoon for the next town to help 
 celebrate a golden wedding. Poor Eliza had been 
 somewhat irate because even this uncommon season 
 of high festival failed to excite her uncle s love for 
 society. She had made him run the gauntlet, as 
 usual on such occasions, by telling him successively 
 that he took no interest in nobody and nothing, and 
 that she was sure she should n t know what to say 
 when people asked where he was ; that it looked real 
 unfeeling and cold-hearted, and he could n t expect 
 folks to show any interest in him. These arguments, 
 with many others, had been brought forward on pre 
 vious occasions until the deacon, knew them all by 
 heart, and he. had listened to them impassively that 
 morning, only observing cautiously to his son that 
 
156 AN ONLY SON. 
 
 Eliza must go through with just so much. But he 
 had promised to come back early from the village, 
 since Eliza and the cousin who was to call for her 
 meant to start soon after twelve. It was a long 
 drive, and they wished to be in good season for the 
 gathering of the clans. 
 
 He left the horse standing in the yard and went 
 into the house, feeling carefully at his inner coat 
 pocket as he did so. Eliza had been watching for 
 him, but the minute he came in sight she had left the 
 window and begun to scurry about in the pantry. 
 The deacon did not stop to speak to her, but went 
 directly to his bedroom, and after a moment s thought 
 placed the precious wallet deep under the pillows. 
 This act was followed by another moment s reflec 
 tion, and as the old man turned, his son stood before 
 him in the doorway. Neither spoke ; there was a 
 feeling of embarrassment which was not uncommon 
 
 o 
 
 between them ; but presently the young man said, 
 " Eliza s been waiting for you to have your dinner ; 
 she s in a great hurry to get off. I 11 be in just as 
 quick as I take care of the horse." 
 
 " You let her be ; I 11 put her up myself/ said 
 the deacon, a little ungraciously. " I guess Eliza 11 
 be there soon enough. I should n t think she d want 
 to start to ride way over there right in the middle of 
 
AN ONLY SON. 157 
 
 the day." At another time he would have been 
 pleased with Warren s offer of aid, for that young 
 man s bent was not in what we are pleased to call a 
 practical direction. As he left the kitchen he no 
 ticed for the first time Mrs. Starbird, who sat by the 
 farther window dressed in her best, and evidently 
 brimming over with reproachful impatience. Deacon 
 Price was a hospitable man, and stopped to shake 
 hands with her kindly, and to explain that he had 
 been delayed by some business that had come before 
 the selectmen. He was politely assured that the 
 delay was not of the least consequence, for Mrs. 
 Starbird was going to drive the colt, and could make 
 up the lost time on the road. As they stood talking, 
 Eliza s footsteps were heard behind them, and with 
 out turning or deigning to enter into any conversa 
 tion with his niece the deacon went out into the 
 bright sunlight again. 
 
 Warren had preceded him after all, and was un 
 fastening one of the traces, and his father unbuckled 
 the other without a word. u You go in and have 
 your dinner, why won t you, father?" the young 
 man said, looking up appealingly. " You need n t 
 be afraid but I 11 do this all right." 
 
 " I declare, I was grieved when I saw, as I come 
 up the lane, that you had n t mended up the fence 
 
158 AN ONLY SON. 
 
 there where I told you this forenoon. I had to be 
 off, and there s the two calves right into the garden 
 piece, and I don t know what works they ve been 
 and done. It does seem too bad, Warren." 
 
 The son had worn a pleased and almost triumphant 
 look, as if he had good news to tell, but now his face 
 fell, and he turned crimson with shame and anger. 
 " I would n t have forgot that for anything ! " he 
 stammered. " I ve been hurrying as fast as I could 
 with something I ve been doing I m going off " 
 but his father had already stepped inside the barn 
 door with the hungry horse, and it was no use to say 
 any more. Presently the deacon went into the house 
 and ate his dinner, and after the few dishes had been 
 washed, and Eliza had told him about the bread and 
 a piece of cold boiled beef and a row of blueberry 
 pies and the sheet of gingerbread which she had pro 
 vided for the family s sustenance in her absence, she 
 added that she might not be back until early Wednes 
 day morning, and then she drove away in triumph 
 with cousin Starbird. It was the first outing the 
 good woman had had for more than a year, except 
 for half a day or so, and the deacon wished her good- 
 day with real affection and sympathy, having already 
 asked if she had everything she wanted to carry over, 
 and finally he desired his respects to be given to the 
 
AN ONLY SON. 159 
 
 folks. He stood at the corner of the house and 
 watched her all the way down the lane until she 
 turned into the main road, and Eliza herself was 
 much pleased as she caught sight of him. She waved 
 her hand gallantly, to which he responded by an al 
 most imperceptible inclination of the head and at 
 once turned away. " There ain t a better man alive," 
 said cousin Starbird, whipping the elderly colt ; " he s 
 as set as anybody I ever see, in his own ways, but 
 he s real good hearted. I don t know anybody I d 
 look to quicker than him if I got into misfortune. 
 He s aged a good deal this last year, don t you think 
 he has, Liza ? Sometimes I feel sure that Warren s 
 odd notions wears on him more than we think." 
 
 " Course they do," said Eliza, throwing back the 
 shawl which she had felt obliged to put on at first, 
 out of respect to the occasion. " His father s mind 
 ful of Warren every hour in the day. He is getting 
 more and more helpless and forgitful, and uncle s 
 growing feeble, and he ain t able either to hire help 
 or to do the farm work himself. Sometimes Warren 
 takes holt real good, but it ain t often ; and there he 
 sets, up in that room he s fixed over the wood-house, 
 and tinkers all day long. Last winter he used to be 
 there till late at night ; he took out one o the win 
 dow panes and set a funnel out through, and used to 
 
160 AN ONLY SON. 
 
 keep a fire going and a bright light up there till one 
 or two o clock in the morning. His father never 
 slept a wink, I don t believe. He looks like a man of 
 hard on to eighty, and he wa n t but sixty-seven his 
 last birthday. I guess Warren s teased him out of 
 about all the bank money he had long ago. There ! 
 I used to get interested myself in Warren s notions 
 about his machines, but now I can t bear to hear him 
 begin, and I go right into the pantry and rattle round 
 as if I was drove to pieces." 
 
 " I suppose his father has indulged him more, see 
 ing that he was so much younger than all the rest of 
 his children, and they being dead anyway. I de 
 clare, I never see such a beautiful creatur as War 
 ren s mother was. I always thought she was kind 
 of homesick here ; t was a lonesome place to me, al 
 ways, and I never counted on its being healthy. The 
 deacon s begun to look kind o mossy, and I don t 
 think it s all worry o mind. It s kind of low land 
 and it s always been called fevery." Cousin Starbird 
 was apt to look on the dark side of things. u You 
 can t always see the marks o trouble," she went on. 
 " There was old John Stacy, that lost three children 
 in one day with scarlet fever, the fall after his wife 
 died ; then his house got afire, and the bank failed 
 where his property was. Job himself could n t be 
 
AN ONLY SON. 161 
 
 no worse off ; and he took on dreadful, as one thing 
 after another come upon him, but there wa n t a 
 younger appearing man of his age anywhere at the 
 time he died. He seemed to spring right up again, 
 like a bent withe. I always thought it was a kind of 
 a pity that the deacon did n t push Warren right off 
 while he was young. He kept him to home trying 
 to make a farm-boy of him till he was a grown man." 
 " Warren used to beseech him dreadfully to let 
 him go off, when I first come over to live," said Eliza 
 Storrow. u He had a great notion of working in 
 some kind of a machine shop, and they said that there 
 wa n t so smart a workman there as he was ; but he 
 got a notion that he could improve on one of the 
 machines, and he lost his interest in workin his 
 trade, and the end of it was that he spent a sight 
 o money to get a patent, and found somebody had 
 stepped in with another just the week before. It 
 was an awful mean thing, too, for some thought it 
 was his notion that had been stole from him. There 
 was a fellow that boarded where he did, to Lowell, 
 that left all of a sudden, and they thought he took 
 the plan, Warren being always free and pleasant 
 with him, and then let somebody else have part 
 of it to get the patent through ; anyway it was n t 
 called for in any name they knew ; Warren was 
 11 
 
162 AN ONLY SON. 
 
 dreadful discouraged about it, and was set against 
 folks knowing, so don t you never say nothing that I 
 said about it. I think he s kind of crazed about 
 machinery, and I don t believe he knows what he s 
 about more than half the time. He never give me a 
 misbeholden word, I 11 say that for him, but it s get 
 ting to be a melancholy habitation if ever I see one," 
 said Eliza, mournfully ; and after this the conversa 
 tion turned to more hopeful themes relating to the 
 golden wedding. 
 
 The deacon had sighed as he turned away. He 
 had wondered if they would make the twelve-mile 
 journey in safety, and smiled in spite of himself as 
 he remembered an old story. He wished he had re 
 minded them of those two old women who were 
 traveling from Dalton to Somerset, and forgot where 
 they came from, and what their names where, and 
 where they were going. After this hidden spring of 
 humor had bubbled to the surface a little too late for 
 anybody s enjoyment but his own, he relapsed into 
 his usual plaintive gravity, and, bringing a hammer 
 and nails and some stakes from the wood-house, he 
 went out to mend the broken fence. It had been 
 patched and propped before, and now seemed hardly 
 to be repaired. The boards and posts had rotted 
 away, and the gamesome calves had forced a wide 
 
AN ONLY SON. 163 
 
 breach in so weak a wall. It was a half afternoon s 
 work, and the day was hot, but the tired old man set 
 about it unflinchingly, and took no rest until he had 
 given the topmost rail a shake and assured himself 
 that it would last through his day. He had brought 
 more tools and pieces of board, and he put these to 
 gether to be replaced. Just as he had begun his 
 work he had caught sight of his son walking quickly 
 away, far beyond the house, across the pastures. 
 The deacon had given a heavy sigh, and as he had 
 hammered and sawed and built his fence again, there 
 had been more than one sigh to follow it, for had not 
 this only sou grown more helpless and useless than 
 ever ? There seemed little to look forward to in life. 
 
 The garden was being sadly treated and hindered 
 by the drought ; the beets and onions were only half 
 grown, and the reliable old herb-bed seemed to have 
 given up the fight altogether. In one place there 
 had once been a flower-bed which belonged to War 
 ren s mother, but it was almost wholly covered with 
 grass. Eliza had no fondness for flowers, and the 
 two men usually were unconscious that there were 
 such things in the world. But this afternoon the 
 deacon was glad to see a solitary sprig of London 
 Pride, which stood out in bold relief against the gray 
 
164 AN ONLY SON. 
 
 post by the little garden gate. It sent a bright ray 
 of encouragement into the shadow of his thoughts, 
 and he went on his way cheerfully. He told himself 
 that now he would attend to the wagon wheels, be 
 cause he should need to start early in the morning, 
 in order to get home before the heat of the day ; it 
 was a hot piece of road from here to the south vil 
 lage. He wondered idly where Warren had gone ; 
 he was glad he had not asked for money that day, 
 but he had done questioning his son about his plans, 
 or even the reason of his occasional absences. 
 
 The side door, which led into the kitchen, was 
 shaded now, and a slight breeze seemed to be com 
 ing across the level fields, so the deacon sat down on 
 the doorstep to rest. The old cat came out as if she 
 wished for company, and rubbed against his arm and 
 mewed without making any noticeable sound.. She 
 put her fore-feet on the old man s knee and looked 
 eagerly in his face and rnewed again inaudibly, and 
 her master laughed and wondered what she wanted. 
 " I suppose the cellar door is locked and bolted, and 
 you want to go down," said the deacon, " that s it, 
 ain t it? I should ha thought Liza would have 
 rec lected about them kittens, should n t you ? " and 
 pleasing himself with the creature s companionship, 
 he rose and entered the house. The cat trotted 
 
AN ONLY SON. 165 
 
 alongside and disappeared quickly down the stair 
 way, and, moved by some strange impulse, Deacon 
 Price went into bis bedroom to make sure that the 
 wallet was safe under the pillow. He did not reach 
 it at first, and he groped again, thinking that he had 
 forgotten he pushed it so far under. But although 
 he eagerly threw off the clothes and the pillows, and 
 shook them twice over, and got down on his hands 
 and knees and crept under the bed, and felt an odd 
 singing noise grow louder and louder in his head, 
 and at last became dizzy and dropped into the near 
 est chair, there was no wallet to be found. 
 
 At last he crept out into the empty kitchen, where 
 the only sound was made by a fly that buzzed dis 
 mally in a spider s web. The air was close and hot 
 in the house, and as the eld man stood in the door 
 way it seemed as if there had some change come over 
 his whole familiar world. He felt puzzled and weak, 
 and at first started to go out to the wagon with the 
 vain hope of finding the lost purse ; it might be that 
 he but there was no use in imagining that he had 
 done anything but put it carefully under the pillow, 
 that his son had stood in the doorway as he lifted his 
 head, and that the money was gone. It was no use 
 to deceive himself, or to hunt through the house ; he 
 had always before his eyes the picture of the pasture 
 
166 AN ONLY SON. 
 
 slope with the well-known figure of his son following 
 across it the path that led to the nearest railroad sta 
 tion, a mile or two away. 
 
 The daylight waned slowly, and the heat of the 
 sun lingered late into the night. Poor John Price 
 went through with his usual duties mechanically, but 
 with perfect care, and he made the doing of his work 
 last as long as he could. The pig and the chickens 
 and the horse were fed ; then there were the cows to 
 bring in from pasture and to be milked ; and at last 
 the poor man even remembered the cat, and gave her 
 a saucer of milk for her supper ; but still it would 
 not grow dark, and still the shame and sorrow weighed 
 him down. In his restlessness he went through the 
 lower rooms of the house, and opened the front door 
 and shut it again, and looked into the stiff little best 
 room, and felt as if he were following the country 
 custom so familiar to him, of watching with the dead. 
 
 He did not get much sleep either, in the uncom 
 fortable bed which he had tried to put into some sort 
 of order before he lay down. Once he prayed aloud 
 that the Lord would vouchsafe him a miracle, and 
 that he might find his trust again, and what was still 
 more precious, his confidence in his only son. For 
 some reason he could not bear the sound of his own 
 voice ; and the thought of his time-honored office in 
 
AN ONLY SON. 167 
 
 the church pained him, for was it not disgraced and 
 made a reproach ? 
 
 Little by little the first sharpness of the shock 
 wore away, and he tried to think what was to be 
 done. The thought seized him that his son might 
 have left some explanation of his going away, and he 
 rose and took a candle and went to the little work 
 shop. There was less than the usual litter of cog 
 wheels and springs and screws, but somehow in the 
 hot little room a feeling of reassurance and almost of 
 hope took possession of him. It might be that War 
 ren s hopes would not be disappointed, that he might 
 be able to repay the stolen sum, that he had only se 
 creted it, and would return later and give it back ; 
 for the poor deacon assured himself over and over 
 that he would talk about the boy s affairs with him, 
 and try again to aid him and to put him into a likely 
 way at last, even if he had to mortgage the farm. 
 
 But in the morning, if there was still no sign of 
 the lad, what could be done ? The money which 
 Jerry Jackson had owed the town as tax-collector, 
 and paid at last that very day, that seven hundred 
 dollars ; the five hundred dollar bill and the two that 
 stood for a hundred each, and some smaller bills 
 which were to pay the interest, how should they 
 be replaced? He had no ready money of any 
 
168 AN ONLY SON. 
 
 amount, nor would have until the pay came for some 
 hay, or unless he could persuade a neighbor, whose 
 payments were honest but slow, to take up a note 
 given for a piece of outlying woodland sold the win 
 ter before. 
 
 All through that long summer night he worried 
 and waited for the morning, and sometimes told him 
 self that his only son had robbed him, and sometimes 
 said that Warren would never serve him like that, 
 and when he came home it would be all made right. 
 The whippoorwills were singing about the house, and 
 one even came to perch on the kitchen doorstep and 
 make its accusing cry. The waning moon rose late, 
 and made a solemn red light in the east, and shone 
 straight in at the little bedroom window as if it were 
 a distant bale-fire on the hills. A little dog kept up 
 a fierce barking by the next farmhouse, far away 
 across the fields, and at last the tired man was ready 
 to think his miserable wakefulness was the fault of 
 the cur. . . . Yes, he had given Warren all the 
 money he could, he had meant well by the boy, and 
 surely now, unless the poor fellow had gone mad, 
 there would be some way out of all this trouble ; at 
 any rate he would not let other people have a 
 chance to call his son a thief until there was no help 
 for it. 
 
AN ONLY SON. 169 
 
 The next morning, after a short, uneasy sleep, from 
 which the deacon had a sad awaking, he hungrily ate 
 some breakfast at the pantry shelves, and harnessed 
 the old horse, and set out on a day s journey of which 
 he hardly knew the end. He shut the door of the 
 house, and locked it, and gave a look of lingering af 
 fection at the old place, even stopping the horse for 
 a minute in the lane that he might turn to survey it 
 again most carefully. He felt as if he were going to 
 do it wrong, and as if it were a conscious thing, the 
 old weather-beaten dwelling that had sheltered him 
 all his life, and those who had been dearest to him. 
 It had no great attractions for a stranger. It was a 
 representative house for that somewhat primitive 
 farming region, though it had fallen out of repair, 
 and wore a damaged and resourceless aspect. Tho 
 appearance of a man s home is exactly characteristic 
 of himself. Human nature is more powerful than its 
 surroundings, and shapes them inevitably to itself. 
 
 It was still very early in the morning, and few per 
 sons were stirring. In fact, Deacon Price met no 
 body on the road except a sleepy boy following his 
 cows to pasture, and he did not feel like looking even 
 him in the face, but gave a pull at the reins to hurry 
 the horse and pass by the quicker. He took a cross 
 road that was cool and shady at that hour, and while 
 
170 AN ONLY SON. 
 
 he journeyed slowly up the rough by-way he let the 
 horse choose its own course without guidance. Some 
 birds were crying and calling in the woods close by, 
 as if it were altogether a day of ill omen and disaster. 
 John Price felt more and more as if his world was 
 coming to an end, and everything was going to pieces. 
 He never had understood his son very well ; there 
 are some people who are like the moon, always with 
 one side hidden and turned away, and Warren was 
 only half familiar to his father. The old man had 
 been at first inclined to treat his bright boy with a 
 sort of respect and reverence, but in later years this 
 had changed little by little to impatience and suspi 
 cion. It had been a great mortification that he had 
 been obliged to maintain him, and once when some 
 body, pe rhaps Eliza Storrow, had been commenting 
 upon a certain crop of wild oats which a neighboring 
 lad had arranged for his harvesting, the deacon was 
 heard to mutter, " Better them than no crop at all ! " 
 Yet he had never suffered his acquaintances to com 
 ment upon his son s behavior ; his own treatment of 
 him in public had insisted upon the rendering of re 
 spect from other people, but he had not acknowledged 
 to himself, until this last sad night, that there was no 
 practical result to be hoped for from Warren s gifts 
 and graces. This might have been borne, and they 
 
AN ONLY SON. 171 
 
 might have struggled on together, somehow or other, 
 but for the terrible blow of the theft of the town s 
 money, which had left a debt and sorrow on the old 
 man s shoulders almost too heavy to be borne. 
 
 In a short time the woods .were passed and the 
 road led out to a pleasant country of quite a different 
 character from the lowland neighborhood left behind. 
 There were gently sloping hills and long lines of 
 elms, and the farms looked more prosperous. One 
 farm only on this road was unproductive, and it was 
 partly the fault of art, and partly of nature, for this 
 was the homestead of Captain Stone, a better sailor 
 than farmer. Its pastures were gathering-places for 
 the ledges, and its fields had been made swampy by 
 many springs. It seemed to be the waste corner of 
 that region for all unused and undeveloped materials 
 of farming land ; but while there was every requisite, 
 there was a chaotic and primitive arrangement or no- 
 arrangement. Yet the captain had settled down here 
 in blissful content as a tiller of the soil ; and while he 
 might have bought the best farm in the county, he 
 congratulated himself upon his rare privileges here, 
 and would have found more level and kindly acres as 
 uninteresting as being becalmed in tropic seas. He 
 worked his farm as he had sailed his ships, by using 
 tact and discretion, and with true seaman s philoso- 
 
172 AN ONLY SON. 
 
 phy he never fretted. He waited for the wind to 
 change, or the tide of spring to flow, or of winter to 
 ebb, for he had long ago learned there was no hurry 
 ing nature ; and to hear him talk of one of his small 
 plots of thin hay or slow-growing potatoes, you would 
 have thought it an intelligent creature which existed 
 mainly on his benevolent encouragement and toler 
 ance. By some persons the captain was laughed at, 
 arid by others he was condemned. The trouble was 
 that he had a shrewd insight into human nature, and 
 was so impossible to deceive or to persuade against his 
 will that he had made many enemies, who had hoped 
 to grow rich by emptying the good old man s pockets. 
 It was to this lifelong friend that Deacon Price 
 had turned in his extremity ; but as he drew nearer 
 that morning to the red house on the hilltop, his 
 heart began to fail him, for what if he should be re 
 fused ! There seemed no other resource, in such a 
 case, but to make the sad occurrence known, or to go 
 away in search of Warren himself. He could put 
 the deeds of his farm, those worn deeds that had 
 come down from father to son generation after gen 
 eration, into the hands of the other selectmen, who 
 would be sure to stand his friends and keep the secret 
 for a time. Warren had looked discouraged, and 
 pale, and desperate in the last month, and his father 
 
AN ONLY SON. 173 
 
 suddenly remembered this, and groaned aloud as he 
 wished that the boy had come to him, and that he 
 had made it possible, instead of coldly ignoring and 
 disapproving him day after day ; such a mixture of 
 wrath and shame and compassion has seldom been in 
 a father s heart. 
 
 The captain was abroad early, and the deacon saw 
 him first, sauntering about at the foot of the slope on 
 which his house and buildings stood. He seemed to 
 be examining the soil, and greeted his guest with a 
 hearty satisfaction. The deacon slowly alighted, and 
 leaving his trusty steed to gnaw the fence or browse 
 among the bushes as she chose, went into the field. 
 He walked feebly, and when he met the captain he 
 could hardly find words to tell his errand. Men of 
 his kind are apt to be made silent by any great oc 
 currence ; they have rarely anything but a limited 
 power of expression, and their language only serves 
 them for common use. Those who have lived close 
 to nature understand each other without speech, as 
 dogs or horses do, and the elder generations of New 
 Englanders knew less of society and human com 
 panionship and association than we can comprehend. 
 
 The captain had watched his visitor as he came 
 toward him, and when they met he gave one quick, 
 
174 AN ONLY SON. 
 
 final look, and then proceeded to make use of his 
 usual forms of greeting, as if he had no idea that 
 anything was the matter. 
 
 " I ve taken a notion to set out some cramb ries 
 hereabouts, another year," he announced. " I never 
 made a voyage to sea without cramb ries aboard, if I 
 could help myself. They last well, and taste sprightly 
 when other things is begun to lose savor. I don t 
 cut any hay to speak of, in this piece. I Ve been 
 meaning to tackle it somehow, see here," push 
 ing it with his great foot, " it s all coming up 
 brakes and sedge. I do know s you want to be 
 standing about it is master spongy for good grass 
 land, and t would be a great expense to drain it off. 
 I s pose I m gettin too old to try any of these new 
 notions, but they sort of divert me. We re having 
 a bad spell o drought, ain t we ? T is all tops of 
 rocks about here, and we re singed pretty brown." 
 The captain chattered more briskly than was his 
 wont ; it would have been impossible to mistake that 
 he was a sailor, for indeed that business stamps its 
 followers with an unmistakable brand. 
 
 They had ventured upon a wetter spot than usual, 
 and when the deacon pulled up his foot from the mire 
 underneath with a resounding plop, his host proposed 
 that they should seek the higher ground. 
 
AN ONLY SON. 175 
 
 " Pretty smart at home ? " asked the captain pres 
 ently, to end a season of strange silence, and the 
 deacon replied, at first somewhat sorrowfully, that 
 they were middling, but explained directly that Eliza 
 was away for a couple o nights, and Warren too ; it 
 cost a great effort to speak the young man s name. 
 
 " Oh yes, I rec lect," growled the captain, amiably. 
 " You spoke about the golden weddin yisterday ; I 
 should thought you d ha gone too, along with Liza ; 
 such junkets ain t to be had every day. I must say 
 I wish something or other would happen to take Mis 
 Hawkes s attention off of me," dropping his voice 
 cautiously, as they came nearer to the house. " She s 
 had a dreadful grumpy time of it, this week past, and 
 looked homely enough to stop a clock. I used to be 
 concerned along in the first of it, when I come off 
 the sea, but I found it did n t do no hurt, and so I let 
 her work, and first thing you know the wind is 
 veered round again handsome, and off we go." 
 
 The deacon tried to laugh at this ; they had seated 
 themselves on the off side of the woodpile, under the 
 shade of a great choke-pear tree. They had mounted 
 the chopping-block, which was a stout elm log, stand 
 ing on six legs, so that it looked like some stupid, 
 blunderheaded creature of not altogether harmless 
 disposition. The two old men were quite at its mercy 
 
176 AN ONLY SON. 
 
 if it should canter away suddenly ; but they talked for 
 some minutes on ordinary subjects, and even left their 
 position to go to inspect the pigs, and returned again, 
 before the deacon arrived at an explanation of his 
 errand. 
 
 It was a hard thing to do, and the captain turned 
 and looked at him narrowly. 
 
 " I ve got to use the money right away as soon as 
 I can have it. I want to see to some business this 
 forenoon ; you know I Ve been calc latin to go to 
 the South village to-day anyway. I did n t know for 
 certain I should have to see about this, or I would n t 
 have given you such short notice " and here the 
 deacon stopped again ; it had come very near an un 
 truth, this last sentence, and he would not cheat the 
 man of whom he was asking so great a favor. 
 
 " I did n t fetch the papers along because I did n t 
 know how t would be with you," he explained ; 
 " they 11 make you safe. Austin s folks was talking 
 round, this spring, to see if I wanted to part with our 
 north field ; his youngest son s a smart fellow, and 
 wants to set up for himself and have a truck farm. 
 But I m only asking the loan for a time, ye know, 
 neighbor," and the deacon looked anxiously at the 
 old captain, and then leaned over, poking the chips 
 about with the butt of his whip, which he had brought 
 with him from the wagon. 
 
AN ONLY SON. 177 
 
 "You shall have it," said the captain at last. 
 " T ain t everybody I d do such a thing to obleege, 
 and I am only going to have my say about one thing, 
 John : I never had no family of my own, and I sup 
 pose the feelin s of a father are somethin I don t 
 know nothing about, for or against ; but I must say I 
 hate to see ye an old man before your time, runnin 
 all out and looking discouraged on account o favorin 
 Warren. You 11 come in astern o the lighter, and 
 he too ; and if he s been beseechin ye to get this 
 money together to further his notions, I m doing ye 
 both a wrong to let ye have it. But I can t deny ye, 
 and I ve got more than what ye say ye want, right 
 here in the house as it happens. I was going to buy 
 into that new three-masted schooner the Otises have 
 got on the stocks now ; I don t know but I am getting 
 along in years to take hold of anything new in navi 
 gation." 
 
 " I ain t intending to let Warren have none o 
 this," said the deacon, humbly, and he longed to say 
 more, and felt as if he never could hold up his head 
 again among his fellows ; and the time seemed very 
 long and dreary before the captain came back from 
 his house with the note ready to sign, and the eight 
 hundred dollars ready to place in the deacon s gray 
 and shaking hand. His benefactor pondered long 
 12 
 
178 AN ONLY SON. 
 
 over this strange visit, longing to know what had 
 happened, but he assured himself over and over that 
 he could n t help letting him have it, and if never a 
 cent of it came back there was nobody he was glad 
 der to oblige. And John Price took his weary way 
 to the South village of Dalton and paid a sum of 
 seven hundred and thirty-five dollars to the creditors 
 of the town. It was not until early in the afternoon 
 that old Abel Stone suddenly bethought himself that 
 something might have happened about that payment 
 of Jerry Jackson s. If he were not growing old and 
 a fool at last ! Why had n t he asked the deacon if 
 he had lost the money he had taken home from the 
 selectmen s office ! And when Mrs. Hawkes after 
 ward ventured to ask him a harmless question he had 
 grown red in the face and poured forth a torrent of 
 nautical language which had nearly taken her breath 
 away, without apparent reason or excuse. The cap 
 tain, it must be confessed, was an uncommon swearer ; 
 he was one of the people who seem to serve as 
 volcanoes or outlets for the concealed anger of poor 
 human nature. It is difficult to explain why pro 
 fanity seems so much more unlawful and shocking in 
 some persons than in others, but there was something 
 fairly amusing in the flurry and sputter of irreverent 
 words which betokened excitement of any kind in 
 
AN ONLY SON. 179 
 
 the mind of Captain Stone. He even forgot himself 
 so far as to swear a little occasionally in the course 
 of earnest exhortations in the evening prayer-meet 
 ings. There was not a better man or a sincerer 
 Christian in the town of Dalton, though he had be 
 come a church-member late in life ; and knowing this, 
 there was never anything but a compassionate smile 
 when he grew red in the face with zeal, and recom 
 mended those poor wretched damned dogs of heathen 
 to mercy. 
 
 Nothing seemed to have changed outwardly at the 
 South village. John Price did his errands and finished 
 his business as quickly as possible, and avoided meet 
 ing his acquaintances, for he could not help fearing 
 that he should be questioned about this miserable 
 trouble. As he left the bank he could not help giv 
 ing a sigh of relief, for that emergency was bridged 
 over ; and for a few minutes he kept himself by main 
 force from looking at the future or asking himself 
 " What next ? " 
 
 But as he turned into his dust-powdered lane again 
 at noon, the curious little faces of the mayweed blos 
 soms seemed to stare up at him, and there was no 
 body to speak to him, and the house was like a tomb 
 where all the years of his past were lying dead, and 
 
180 AN ONLY SON. 
 
 all the pleasantness of life existed only in remem 
 brance. 
 
 He began to wish for Warren in a way he never 
 had before, and as he looked about the house he saw 
 everywhere some evidence of his mechanical skill. 
 Had not Eliza Storrow left home without a fear be 
 cause, as she always said, Warren was as handy as a 
 woman ? The remembrance of his patient diligence 
 at his own chosen work, his quietness under reproof, 
 his evident discomfort at having to be dependent upon 
 his father, linked to a perfect faith in the ultimate 
 success of his plans, the thought of all these things 
 flashed through the old man s mind. " I wish I had 
 waited till he told me what he had to say, yister- 
 day," said Deacon Price to himself. " T was strange 
 about that fence too. He s al ays been willing to 
 take holt and help whenever I spoke to him." He 
 even came to believe that the boy had grown des 
 perate, and in some emergency had gone in search of 
 new materials for his machine. " He s so forgitful," 
 said the father, " he may have forgot to speak about 
 the money, and t was but a small-looking roll of 
 bills. He 11 be back to-night, like s not, as con 
 cerned as can be when he finds out what t was he 
 took." It was the way we only remember the good 
 qualities of our friends who have died, and let the 
 
AN ONLY SON. 181 
 
 bad ones fade out of sight, and so know the angels 
 that were growing in them all the while, and out of 
 our sight at last have thrown off the disguise and hin 
 drance of the human shape. 
 
 Towards evening Jacob Austin, a neighbor, came 
 into the yard on an errand, and was astonished to see 
 how tired and old the deacon looked. He had left 
 the oxen and their great load of coarse meadow hay 
 standing at the end of the lane in the road, and he 
 meant at first to shoulder the borrowed pitchfork and 
 quickly rejoin them, but it was impossible. He asked 
 if anything were the matter, and was answered that 
 there was something trying about such a long spell of 
 drought, which did not in the least satisfy his curi 
 osity. 
 
 " No," said the deacon, " I m getting to be an old 
 man, but I keep my health fairly. Eliza arid War 
 ren, they re both off tending to their own concerns, 
 but I make sure one or both of m 11 be back to 
 ward sundown." And Jacob, after casting about in 
 his mind for anything further to say, mentioned again 
 that t was inconvenient to break a pitchfork right in 
 the middle of loading a rack, and went away. 
 
 " Looked to me as if he had had a stroke," he told 
 his family that night at supper time ; and the con- 
 
182 AN ONLY SON. 
 
 duct of Warren and Eliza Storrow, in going off and 
 leaving the old deacon to shift for himself, was more 
 severely commented upon. 
 
 But all this time, the latter half of that Tuesday 
 afternoon, Eliza and her cousin Starbird were jog 
 ging toward home over the Dalton and Somerset 
 hills. The colt was in good trim, and glad to be 
 nearing his own familiar stall again, and struck out 
 at an uncommonly good pace, though none of the 
 swiftest at that. It was hardly six o clock when the 
 two tired-out and severely sunburnt women came into 
 the yard. The deacon heard the high-pitched voice 
 which he knew so well before he heard the sound of 
 the wheels on the soft, dry turf, and went out to 
 greet the new comers, half glad and half afraid. 
 Eliza took it for granted that Warren was either in 
 the workshop as usual, or, as she scornfully expressed 
 it, roaming the hills, and did not ask for him. Cousin 
 Starbird had accepted an invitation to tea, as her 
 home was three miles farther on. They were both 
 heavy women, and stiff from sitting still so long in 
 the old wagon, and they grumbled a little as they 
 walked toward the house. 
 
 " Yes, t was a splendid occasion," Eliza answered 
 the deacon, as he stood near, hitching the colt to a 
 much gnawed post. " It all went off beautifully* 
 
AN ONLY SON. 183 
 
 Everybody wanted to know where you was, an War 
 ren. There, we talked till we was all about dead, 
 and eat ourselves sick ; you never saw a handsomer 
 table in your life. The old folks stood it well, but I 
 see they d begun to kind o give out at dinner-time 
 to-day, last night was the celebration, you know, 
 because lots could come in the evenin that was oc 
 cupied by day. They wanted us to stop longer, but 
 I see t was best to break it up, and I d rather go 
 over again by an by, and spend the day in peace an 
 quietness, and have a good visit. We ve been say 
 ing, as we rode along, that we should n t be surprised 
 if the old folks kind o faded out after this, they ve 
 been lookin forward to it so long. Well, it s all 
 over, like a boss-race ; " and Eliza heaved a great sigh 
 and went into the front room to open the blinds and 
 make it less stuffy ; then she removed her best bon 
 net in her own room, and presently came out to get 
 tea, dressed in her familiar every-day calico gown. 
 
 The deacon was sitting by the open window, drum 
 ming on the sill ; he had a trick of beating a slow 
 tattoo with the ends of his queerly shaped fingers. 
 They were long and dry, and somehow did not look 
 as if they were useful, though John Price had been 
 a hard-working man. Cousin Starbird had come 
 down-stairs first, and had gone out to get a piece of 
 
184 AN ONLY SON. 
 
 the golden wedding cake that had been left in the 
 wagon. Eliza was busy in the pantry, scolding a 
 good deal at the state she found it in. 
 
 " Whatever is this great thing in my pocket ! " she 
 exclaimed, for something had struck the table-leg as 
 she came by it to bring the last brace of blueberry 
 pies ; and quickly fumbling in the pocket s depths 
 she brought up in triumph the deacon s great brown 
 wallet, and presented it to its owner. 
 
 " Good King Agrippy ! " said the amazed man, 
 snatching it, and then holding it and looking at it 
 as if he were afraid it would bite. 
 
 " I ain t give it a thought, from that minute to 
 this," said Eliza, who was not a little frightened. " I 
 s pose you ve been thinking you lost it. I thought 
 you looked dreadful wamblecropped when I first saw 
 you. Why, you see, I did n t undertake to wash 
 yesterday mornin , because I did n t want the clothes 
 a-layin and mildewin , and I kind of thought perhaps 
 I d put it off till next week, anyway, though it ain t 
 my principle to do fortnight s washes. An I had so 
 much to do, gettin ready to start, that I d gone in 
 early and made up your bed and not put a clean 
 sheet on ; but you was busy takin out the hoss after 
 you come home at noon, and had your dinner to eat, 
 and I had the time to spare, so I just slipped in and 
 
AN ONLY SON. 185 
 
 stripped off the bedclothes then, and this come out 
 from under the pillow. I meant to hand it to you 
 when you come in from the barn, but I forgot it the 
 next minute ; you know we was belated about start 
 ing, and I was scatter-witted. I hope it ain t caused 
 you no great inconvenience ; you ain t wanted it for 
 anything very special, have you ? I s pose t was 
 foolish to go fussin about the bed, but I thought if 
 you should be sick or anything " 
 
 " Well, I ve got it now," said the deacon, draw 
 ing a long breath. " I own I felt some uneasy about 
 it," and he went out to the yard, and beyond it to 
 the garden, and beyond the garden to the family 
 burying-lot in the field. He would have gone to his 
 parish church to pray if he had been a devout Catho 
 lic ; as it was, this was the nearest approach he could 
 make to a solemn thanksgiving. 
 
 Some of the oldest stones lay flat on the ground, 
 and a network of blackberry vines covered them in 
 part. The leaves were burnt by the sun, and the 
 crickets scrambled among them as the deacon s foot 
 fall startled them. His first wife and his second wife 
 both were buried there, their resting-places marked 
 by a slate headstone and a marble one, and it was to 
 this last that the old man went. His first wife had 
 been a plain, hard-worked woman of sterling worth, 
 
186 AN ONLY SON. 
 
 and his fortunes had declined from the day she left 
 him to guard them alone ; hut her successor had been 
 a pale and delicate school-teacher, who had roused 
 some unsuspected longing for beauty and romance in 
 John Price s otherwise prosaic nature. She had 
 seemed like a windflower growing beside a ledge ; 
 and her husband had been forced to confess that she 
 was not fit for a farmer s wife. If he could have 
 had a combination of his two partners, he had once 
 ventured to think, he would have been exactly suited. 
 But it seemed to him, as he stood before the grave 
 with his head bowed, the only way of making some 
 sign of his sorrow, he had wrongfully accused an in 
 nocent man, his son and hers ; and there he stayed, 
 doing penance as best he could, until Eliza s voice 
 called him to the house, and to some sort of comfort 
 able existence and lack of self-reproof. 
 
 Before they had finished supper Warren came in, 
 looking flushed and tired ; but he took his seat at the 
 table after a pleasant greeting, and the deacon passed 
 him every plate within reach, treating him with un 
 common politeness. The father could not help notic 
 ing that his son kept stealing glances at him, and 
 that he looked pleased and satisfied. It seemed to 
 him as if Warren must have known of his suspicions 
 and of their happy ending, but it was discovered 
 
AN ONLY SON. 187 
 
 presently that the long-toiled-over machine had been 
 proved a success. Warren had taken it to his former 
 employer at Lowell, who had promised, so great was 
 his delight with it, to pay the expenses of getting the 
 patent in exchange for a portion of the right. " He 
 said there would be no end to the sale of it," said the 
 young man, looking eagerly at his father s face. " I 
 would n t have run off so yesterday, but I was so full 
 of it I could n t bear to think of losing the cars, and 
 I did n t want to say one word about this thing till I 
 was sure. 
 
 " I expect I have been slack," he continued with 
 evident effort, while they leaned over the garden 
 fence, and he looked at his father appealingly. " But 
 the fact is, I could n t seem to think of other things ; 
 it took all there was of me to keep right after that. 
 But now I m going to take right hold and be some 
 help about the place. I don t seem to want to touch 
 a tool again for a year." He looked pale and rest 
 less ; the reaction from his long excitement had set in. 
 
 The deacon gave a shaky laugh, and struck his 
 son s shoulder by way of a clumsy caress. " Don t 
 you go to frettin yourself now," he said. " I ain t 
 felt so pleased as I do to-day since the day you come 
 into the world. I sort of felt certain then that you 
 was goin to be somebody, I do know why t was," 
 
188 AN ONLY SON. 
 
 and he turned away suddenly toward the house. 
 " If you are as rich as you say you be, I should n t 
 wonder if between us we had n t better get them 
 blinds painted, and smart up a little, another year. 
 I declare, the old place has begun to look consider 
 able gone to seed. 7 
 
 That night a great thunder-shower broke the spell 
 of the long drought, and afterward, until morning, 
 the rain fell fast upon the thirsty ground,. It was a 
 good night to sleep, Eliza had said, as she wearily 
 climbed the crooked backstairs at nine o clock, for 
 there was already a coolness in the air. She never 
 was told the whole of the story about the wallet, for 
 when she heard part of it she only said it was just 
 like a man, they were generally the most helpless 
 creatur s alive. He might have known she had put 
 it away somewhere. Why did n t he come and ask 
 her ? He never seemed to mistrust that it was a di 
 rect p inting out of his duty to ride over to Somerset 
 to the gathering, and just speak to the folks. 
 
 In the early morning, while it was cool and wet, 
 the deacon drove up to the captain s farm, and the 
 two selectmen perched on the chopping log again, 
 and the confession was made and listened to with 
 great gravity. The captain swore roundly in his 
 
AN ONLY SON. 189 
 
 satisfaction, and said he was going to have a square 
 talk with Warren, and advise with him a little, for 
 fear that those landsharks down in Lowell should 
 undertake to cheat him. He stowed away the repay 
 ment of the loan in one of his big pockets, as if it 
 were of little consequence to him, but he announced 
 with considerable satisfaction at the next selectmen s 
 meeting, that he owned a few planks of that three- 
 masted schooner which the Otises were about ready 
 to launch. And he winked at Deacon Price in a 
 way that their brother Kendall was not able to un 
 derstand. 
 
MISS DEBBY S NEIGHBORS. 
 
 THERE is a class of elderly New England women 
 which is fast dying out : those good souls who have 
 sprung from a soil full of the true New England in 
 stincts ; who were used to the old-fashioned ways, and 
 whose minds were stored with quaint country lore 
 and tradition. The fashions of the newer generations 
 do not reach them ; they are quite unconscious of the 
 western spirit and enterprise, and belong to the old 
 days, and to a fast-disappearing order of things. 
 
 But a shrewder person does not exist than the 
 spokeswoman of the following reminiscences, whose 
 simple history can be quickly told, since she spent 
 her early life on a lonely farm, leaving it only once 
 for any length of time, one winter when she learned 
 her trade of tailoress. She afterward sewed for her 
 neighbors, and enjoyed a famous reputation for her 
 skill ; but year by year, as she grew older, there was 
 less to do, and at last, to use her own expression, 
 "Everybody got into the way of buying cheap, ready- 
 
MISS DEBBY S NEIGHBORS. 191 
 
 made-up clothes, just to save em a little trouble," and 
 she found herself out of business, or nearly so. After 
 her mother s death, and that of her favorite younger 
 brother Jonas, she left the farm and came to a little 
 house in the village, where she lived most comforta 
 bly the rest of her life, having a small property which 
 she used most sensibly. She was always ready to 
 render any special service with her needle, and was a 
 most welcome guest in any household, and a most ef 
 ficient helper. To be in the same room with her for 
 a while was sure to be profitable, and as she grew 
 older she was delighted to recall the people and 
 events of her earlier life, always filling her descrip 
 tions with wise reflections and much quaint humor. 
 She always insisted, not without truth, that the rail 
 roads were making everybody look and act of a piece, 
 and that the young folks were more alike than peo 
 ple of her own day. It is impossible to give the de- 
 lightfulness of her talk in any written words, as well 
 as many of its peculiarities, for her way of going 
 round Robin Hood s barn between the beginning of 
 her story and its end can hardly be followed at all, 
 and certainly not in her own dear loitering footsteps. 
 On an idle day her most devoted listener thought 
 there was nothing better worth doing than to watch 
 this good soul at work. A book was held open for 
 
192 MISS DEBBY S NEIGHBORS. 
 
 the looks of the thing, but presently it was allowed 
 to flatter its leaves and close, for Miss Debby began 
 without any apparent provocation : 
 
 " They may say whatever they have a mind to, 
 but they can t persuade me that there s no such thing 
 as special providences," and she twitched her strong 
 linen thread so angrily through the carpet she was 
 sewing, that it snapped and the big needle flew into 
 the air. It had to be found before any further re 
 marks could be made, and the listener also knelt 
 down to search for it. After a while it was discovered 
 clinging to Miss Debby s own dress, and after rehar- 
 nessing it she went to work again at her long seam. 
 It was always significant of a succession of Miss 
 Debby s opinions when she quoted and berated cer 
 tain imaginary persons whom she designated as 
 " They," who stood for the opposite side of the ques 
 tion, and who merited usually her deepest scorn and 
 fullest antagonism. Her remarks to these offending 
 parties were always prefaced with " I tell em," and 
 to the listener s mind " they " always stood rebuked, 
 but not convinced, in spiritual form it may be, but 
 most intense reality ; a little group as solemn as Miss 
 Debby herself. Once the listener ventured to ask 
 who " they " were, in her early childhood, but she 
 was only answered by a frown. Miss Debby knew 
 
MISS DEBBY S NEIGHBORS. 193 
 
 as well as any one the difference between figurative 
 language and a lie. Sometimes they said what was 
 right and proper, and were treated accordingly ; but 
 very seldom, and on this occasion it seemed that they 
 had ventured to trifle with sacred things. 
 
 " I suppose you re too young to remember John 
 Ashby s grandmother ? A good woman she was, and 
 she had a dreadful time with her family. They never 
 could keep the peace, and there was always as many 
 as two of them who did n t speak with each other. It 
 seems to come down from generation to generation 
 
 like a curse ! " And Miss Debby spoke the last 
 
 word as if she had meant it partly for her thread, 
 which had again knotted and caught, and she snatched 
 
 O o 
 
 the offered scissors without a word, but said peacea 
 bly, after a minute or two, that the thread was n t 
 what it used to be. The next needleful proved more 
 successful, and the listener asked if the Ashbys were 
 getting on comfortably at present. 
 
 " They always behave as if they thought they 
 needed nothing," was the response. " Not that I 
 mean that they are any ways contented, but they 
 never will give in that other folks holds a candle to 
 em. There s one kind of pride that I do hate, 
 when folks is satisfied with their selves and don t see 
 no need of improvement. I believe in self-respect, but 
 
 13 
 
194 MI88 DEBBY S NEIGHBORS. 
 
 I believe in respecting other folks s rights as much as 
 your own ; but it takes an Ashby to ride right over 
 you. I tell em it s the spirit of the tyrants of old, 
 and it s the kind of pride that goes before a fall. 
 John Ashby s grandmother was a clever little woman 
 as ever stepped. She came from over Hardwick way, 
 and I think she kep em kind of decent-behaved 
 as long as she was round ; but she got wore out a 
 doin of it, an went down to her grave in a quick 
 consumption. My mother set up with her the night 
 she died. It was in May, towards the latter part, and 
 an awful rainy night. It was the storm that al 
 ways comes in apple-blossom time. I remember well 
 that mother come crying home in the morning and 
 told us Mis Ashby was dead. She brought Marilly 
 with her, that was about my own age, and was 
 taken away within six months afterwards. She pined 
 herself to death for her mother, and when she caught 
 the scarlet fever she went as quick as cherry-bloom 
 when it s just ready to fall and a wind strikes it. 
 She wa n t like the rest of em. She took after her 
 mother s folks altogether. 
 
 "You know our farm was right next to theirs, 
 the one Asa Hopper owns now, but he s let it all run 
 out, and so, as we lived some ways from the stores, 
 we had to be neighborly, for we depended on each 
 
MISS DEBBY S NEIGHBORS. 195 
 
 other for a good many things. Families in lonesome 
 places get out of one supply and another, and have to 
 borrow until they get a chance to send to the village ; 
 or sometimes in a busy season some of the folks would 
 have to leave work and be gone half a day. Land, 
 you don t know nothing about old times, and the life 
 that used to go on about here. You can t step into a 
 house anywheres now that there ain t the county map 
 and they don t fetch out the photograph book ; and 
 in every district you 11 find all the folks has got the 
 same chromo picture hung up, and all sorts of lux 
 uries and makeshifts o splendor that would have 
 made the folks I was fetched up by stare their eyes 
 out o their heads. It was all we could do to keep 
 along then ; and if anybody was called rich, it was 
 only because he had a great sight of land, and then 
 it was drudge, drudge the harder to pay the taxes. 
 There was hardly any ready money ; and I recollect 
 well that old Tommy Simms was reputed wealthy, 
 and it was told over fifty times a year that he d got 
 a solid four thousand dollars in the bank. He strutted 
 round like a turkey-cock, and thought he ought to 
 have his first say about everything that was going. 
 
 " I was talking about the Ashbys, was n t I ? I do 
 know s I ever told you about the fight they had after 
 their father died about the old house. Joseph was 
 
196 MISS DEBBY S NEIGHBORS. 
 
 married to a girl he met in camp-meeting time, who 
 had a little property two or three hundred dollars 
 from an old great uncle that she d been keeping 
 house for; and I don t know what other plans she 
 may have had for spending of her means, but she 
 laid most of it out in a husband ; for Joseph never 
 cared any great about her that I could see, though 
 he always treated her well enough. She was a poor 
 ignorant sort of thing, seven years older than he was ; 
 but she had a pleasant kind of a face, and seemed 
 like an overgrown girl of six or eight years old. I 
 remember just after they was married Joseph was 
 taken down with a quinsy sore throat, being always 
 subject to them, and mother was over in the fore 
 noon, and she was one that was always giving right 
 hand and left, and she told Susan Ellen that was 
 his wife to step over in the afternoon arid she 
 would give her some blackberry preserve for him ; 
 she had some that was nice and it was very healing. 
 So along about half-past one o clock, just as we had 
 got the kitchen cleared, and mother and I had got out 
 the big wheels to spin a few rolls, we always liked 
 to spin together, and mother was always good com 
 pany; my brother Jonas that was the youngest of 
 us looked out of the window, and says he : Here 
 comes Joe Ashby s wife with a six-quart pail. 
 
MISS DEBBY S NEIGHBORS. 197 
 
 " Mother she began to shake all over with a laugh 
 she tried to swallow down, but I did n t know what 
 it was all about, and in come poor Susan Ellen and 
 lit on the edge of the first chair and set the pail down 
 beside of her. We tried to make her feel welcome, 
 and spoke about everything we could contrive, seein 
 as it was the first time she d been over ; and she 
 seemed grateful and did the best she could, and lost 
 her strangeness with mother right away, for mother 
 was the best hand to make folks feel to home with 
 her that I ever come across. There ain t many like 
 her now, nor never was, I tell em. But there wa n t 
 nothing said about the six-quart pail, and there it set 
 on the floor, until Susan Ellen said she must be go 
 ing and mentioned that there was something said 
 about a remedy for Joseph s throat. Oh, yes, says 
 mother, and she brought out the little stone jar she 
 kept the preserve in, and there wa n t more than the 
 half of it full. Susan Ellen took up the cover off 
 the pail, and I walked off into the bedroom, for I 
 thought I should laugh, certain. Mother put in a 
 big spoonful, and another, and I heard em drop, and 
 she went on with one or two more, and then she give 
 up. < I d give you the jar and welcome, she says, 
 6 but I ain t very well off for preserves, and I was 
 kind of counting on this for tea in case my brother s 
 
198 MISS DEBBY S NEIGHBORS. 
 
 folks are over. Susan Ellen thanked her, and said 
 Joseph would be obliged, and back she went acrost 
 the pasture. I can see that big tin pail now a-shining 
 in the sun. 
 
 " The old man was alive then, and he took a great 
 spite against poor Susan Ellen, though he never 
 would if he had n t been set on by John ; and whether 
 he was mad because Joseph had stepped in to so 
 much good money or what, I don t know, but he 
 twitted him about her, and at last he and the old 
 man between em was too much to bear, and Joe 
 fitted up a couple o rooms for himself in a building 
 he d put up for a kind of work-shop. He used to 
 carpenter by spells, and he clapboarded it and made 
 it as comfortable as he could, and he ordered John 
 out of it for good and all ; but he and Susan Ellen 
 both treated the old sir the best they knew how, and 
 Joseph kept right on with his farm work same as 
 ever, and meant to lay up a little more money to join 
 with his wife s, and push off as soon as he could for 
 the sake of peace, though if there was anybody set 
 by the farm it was Joseph. He was to blame for 
 some things, I never saw an Ashby that was n t, 
 and I dare say he was aggravating. They were clear 
 ing a piece of woodland that winter, and the old man 
 was laid up in the house with the rheumatism, off and 
 
MISS DEBBY S NEIGHBORS. 199 
 
 on, and that inade him fractious, and he and John 
 connived together, till one day Joseph and Susan 
 Ellen had taken the sleigh and gone to Freeport 
 Four Corners to get some flour and one thing and 
 another, and to have the horse shod beside, so they 
 was likely to be gone two or three hours. John 
 Jacobs was going by with his oxen, and John Ashby 
 and the old man hailed him, and said they d give him 
 a dollar if he d help em, and they hitched the two 
 yoke, his and their n, to Joseph s house. There wa n t 
 any foundation to speak of, the sills set right on the 
 ground, and he d banked it up with a few old boards 
 and some pine spills and sand and stuff, just to keep 
 the cold" out. There wa n t but a little snow, and the 
 roads was smooth and icy, and they slipped it along 
 as if it had been a hand-sled, and got it down the 
 road a half a mile or so to the fork of the roads, and 
 left it settiu there right on the heater-piece. Jacobs 
 told afterward that he kind of disliked to do it, but 
 he thought as long as their minds were set, he might 
 as well have the dollar as anybody. He said when 
 the house give a slew on a sideling piece in the road, 
 he heard some of the crockery-ware smash down, and 
 a branch of an oak they passed by caught hold of 
 the stove-pipe that come out through one of the 
 walls, and give that a wrench, but he guessed there 
 
200 MISS DEBBY S NEIGHBORS. 
 
 wa n t no great damage. Joseph may have given em 
 some provocation before he went away in the morn 
 ing, I don t know but he did, and I don t know as he 
 did, but at any rate when he was coming home late 
 in the afternoon he caught sight of his house (some 
 of our folks was right behind, and they saw him), 
 and he stood right up in the sleigh and shook his 
 fist, he was so mad ; but afterwards he bu st out 
 laughin . It did look kind of curi s ; it wa n t bigger 
 than a front entry, and it set up so pert right there 
 on the heater-piece, as if he was calc latin to farm it. 
 The folks said Susan Ellen covered up her face in 
 her shawl and begun to cry. I s pose the pore thing 
 was discouraged. Joseph was awful mad, he was 
 kind of laughing and cryin together. Our folks 
 stopped and asked him if there was anything they 
 could do, and he said no ; but Susan Ellen went in 
 to view how things were, and they made up a fire, 
 and then Joe took the horse home, and I guess they 
 had it hot and heavy. Nobody supposed they d ever 
 make up less there was a funeral in the family to 
 bring em together, the fight had gone so far, but 
 long in the winter old Mr. Ashby, the boys father, 
 was taken down with a spell o sickness, and there 
 wa n t anybody they could get to come and look after 
 the house. The doctor hunted, and they all hunted, 
 
MISS DEBBY S NEIGHBORS. 201 
 
 but there did n t seem to be anybody t wa n t so 
 thick settled as now, and there was no spare help 
 so John had to eat humble pie, and go and ask Susan 
 Ellen if she would n t come back and let by-gones 
 be by-gones. She was as good-natured a creatur as 
 ever stepped, and did the best she knew, and she 
 spoke up as pleasant as could be, and said she d go 
 right off that afternoon and help em through. 
 
 " The old Ashby had been a hard drinker in his day 
 and he was all broke down. Nobody ever saw him 
 that he could n t walk straight, but he got a crooked 
 disposition out of it, if nothing else. I s pose there 
 never was a man loved sperit better. They said one 
 year he was over to Cyrus Parker s to help with the 
 haying, and there was a jug o New England rum 
 over by the spring with some gingerbread and cheese 
 and stuff; and he went over about every half an 
 hour to take something, and along about half-past 
 ten he got the jug middling low, so he went to fill it 
 up with a little water, and lost holt of it and it sunk, 
 and they said he drunk the spring dry three times ! 
 
 "Joe and Susan Ellen stayed there at the old 
 place well into the summer, and then after planting 
 they moved down to the Four Corners where they 
 had bought a nice little place. Joe did well there, 
 he carried on the carpenter trade, and got smoothed 
 
202 MISS DEBBY S NEIGHBORS. 
 
 down considerable, being amongst folks. John he 
 married a Pecker girl, and got his match too ; she 
 was the only living soul he ever was afraid of. They 
 lived on there a spell and why, they must have lived 
 there all of fifteen or twenty years, now I come to 
 think of it, for the time they moved was after the 
 railroad was built. T was along in the winter and 
 his wife she got a notion to buy a place down to the 
 Falls below the Corners after the mills got started and 
 have John work in the spinning-room while she took 
 boarders. She said t wa n t no use staying on the 
 farm, they could n t make a living off from it now 
 they d cut the growth. Joe s folks and she never 
 could get along, and they said she was dreadfully 
 riled up hearing how much Joe was getting in the 
 machine shop. 
 
 " They need n t tell me about special providences 
 being all moonshine," said Miss Debby for the second 
 time, u if here wa n t a plain one, I 11 never say 
 one word more about it. You see, that very time 
 Joe Ashby got a splinter in his eye and they were 
 afraid he was going to lose his sight, and he got a no 
 tion that he wanted to go back to farming. He al 
 ways set everything by the old place, and he had a boy 
 growing up that neither took to his book nor to mill 
 work, and he wanted to farm it too. So Joe got hold 
 
MISS DEBBY S NEIGHBORS. 203 
 
 of John one day when he come in with some wood, 
 and asked him why he would n t take his place for 
 a year or two, if he wanted to get to the village, and 
 let him go out to the old place. My brother Jonas 
 was standin right by and heard em and said he never 
 heard nobody speak civiller. But John swore and 
 said he wa n t going to be caught in no such a trap 
 as that. His father left him the place and he was 
 going to do as he d a mind to. There d be n 
 trouble about the property, for old Mr. Ashby had 
 given Joe some money he had in the bank. Joe had 
 got to be well off, he could have bought most any 
 farm about here, but he wanted the old place count 
 of his attachment. He set everything by his mother, 
 spite of her being dead so long. John had n t done 
 very well spite of his being so sharp, but he let out 
 the best of the farm on shares, and bought a mis able 
 sham-built little house down close by the mills, 
 and then some idea or other got into his head to fit 
 that up to let and move it to one side of the lot, and 
 haul down the old house from the farm to live in 
 themselves. There wa n t no time to lose, else the 
 snow would be gone ; so he got a gang o men up 
 there and put shoes underneath the sills, and then 
 they assembled all the oxen they could call in, and 
 started. Mother was living then, though she d got 
 
204 MISS DEBBY S NEIGHBORS. 
 
 to be very feeble, and when they come for our yoke 
 she wouldn t have Jonas let em go. She said the 
 old house ought to stay in its place. Everybody had 
 been telling John Ash by that the road was too hilly, 
 and besides the house was too old to move, they d 
 rack it all to pieces dragging it so fur ; but he would 
 n t listen to no reason. 
 
 " I never saw mother so stirred up as she was that 
 day, and when she see the old thing a moving she 
 burst right out crying. We could see one end of it 
 looking over the slope of the hill in the pasture be 
 tween it and our house. There was two windows 
 that looked our way, and I know Mis Ashby used 
 to hang a piece o something white out o one of em 
 when she wanted mother to step over for anything. 
 They set a good deal by each other, and Mis Ashby 
 was a lame woman. I should n t ha thought John 
 would had em haul the house right over the little 
 gardin she thought so much of, and broke down the 
 laylocks and flowering currant she set everything by. 
 I remember when she died I was n t more n seven 
 or eight year old, it was all in full bloom and mother 
 she broke off a branch and laid into the coffin. I do 
 know as I ve ever seen any since or set in a room 
 and had the sweetness of it blow in at the windows 
 without remembering that day, t was the first fu- 
 
MISS DEBBY S NEIGHBORS. 205 
 
 neral I ever went to, and that may be some reason. 
 Well, the old house started off and mother watched it 
 as long as she could see it. She was sort o feeble 
 herself then, as I said, and we went on with the work, 
 t was a Saturday, and we was baking and churn 
 ing and getting things to rights generally. Jonas 
 had been over in the swamp getting out some wood 
 he d cut earlier in the winter and along in the 
 afternoon he come in and said he s posed I would n t 
 want to ride down to the Corners so late, and I said 
 I did feel just like it, so we started off. We went 
 the Birch Ridge road, because he wanted to see some 
 body over that way, and when we was going home 
 by the straight road, Jonas laughed and said we had n t 
 seen anything of John Ashby s moving, and he guessed 
 he d got stuck somewhere. He was glad he had n t 
 nothing to do with it. We drove along pretty quick, 
 for we were some belated, and we did n t like to leave 
 mother all alone after it come dark. All of a sudden 
 Jonas stood up in the sleigh, and says he, I don t be 
 lieve but the cars is off the track ; and I looked and 
 there did seem to be something the matter with em. 
 They had n t been running more than a couple o 
 years then, and we was prepared for anything. 
 
 "Jonas he whipped up the horse and we got there 
 pretty quick, and I 11 be bound if the Ashby house 
 
206 MISS DEBBY S NEIGHBORS. 
 
 had n t got stuck fast right on the track, and stir it 
 one way or another they could n t. They M been 
 there since quarter-past one, pulling and hauling, 
 and the men was all hoarse with yelling, and the cars 
 had come from both ways and met there, one each 
 side of the crossing, and the passengers was walk 
 ing about, scolding and swearing, and somebody d 
 gone and lit up a gre t bonfire. You never see such 
 a sight in all your life ! I happened to look up at the 
 old house, and there were them two top windows that 
 used to look over to our place, and they had caught 
 the shine of the firelight, and made the poor old 
 thing look as if it was scared to death. The men 
 was banging at it with axes and crowbars, and it 
 was dreadful distressing. You pitied it as if it was 
 a live creatur . It come from such a quiet place, 
 and always looked kind of comfortable, though so 
 much war had gone on amongst the Ashbys. I 
 tell you it was a judgment on John, for they got it 
 shoved back after a while, and then would n t touch 
 it again, not one of the men, nor let their oxen. 
 The plastering was all stove, and the outside walls all 
 wrenched apart, and John never did anything more 
 about it ; but let it set there all summer, till it burnt 
 down, and there was an end, one night in September. 
 They supposed some traveling folks slept in it and 
 
MISS DEBBY S ~NE1GHBORS. 207 
 
 set it afire, or else some boys did it for fun. I was 
 glad it was out of the way. One day, I know, I was 
 coming by with mother, and she said it made her feel 
 bad to see the little strips of leather by the fore door, 
 where Mis Ashby had nailed up a rosebush once. 
 There ! there ain t an Ashby alive now of the old 
 stock, except young John. Joe s son went off to sea, 
 and I believe he was lost somewhere in the China 
 seas, or else he died of a fever ; I seem to forget. 
 He was called a smart boy, but he never could seem 
 to settle down to anything. Sometimes I wonder 
 folks is as good as they be, when I consider what 
 comes to em from their folks before em, and how 
 they re misshaped by nature. Them Ashbys never 
 was like other folks, and yet some good streak or 
 other there was in every one of em. You can t ex 
 pect much from such hindered creatur s, it s just 
 like beratin a black and white cat for being a poor 
 mouser. It ain t her fault that the mice see her 
 quicker than they can a gray one. If you get one of 
 them masterful dispositions put with a good strong 
 will towards the right, that s what makes the best of 
 men ; but all them Ashbys cared about was to grasp 
 and get, and be cap ns. They liked to see other 
 folks put down, just as if it was going to set them up. 
 And they did n t know nothing. They make me think 
 
208 MISS DEBBY S NEIGHBORS. 
 
 of some o them old marauders that used to hive up 
 into their castles, in old times, and then go out a-over- 
 setting and plundering. And I tell you that same sperit 
 was in em. They was born a couple o hundred years 
 too late. Kind of left-over folks, as it were." And 
 Miss Debby indulged in a quiet chuckle as she bent 
 over her work. " John he got captured by his wife, 
 she carried too many guns for him. I believe he died 
 very poor and her own son would n t support her, so 
 she died over in Freeport poor-house. And Joe got 
 along better ; his wife was clever but rather slack, 
 and it took her a good while to see through things. 
 She married again pretty quick after he died. She 
 had as much as seven or eight thousand dollars, and 
 she was taken just as she stood by a roving preacher 
 that was holding meetings here in the winter time. 
 He sold out her place here, arid they went up country 
 somewheres that he come from. Her boy was lost be 
 fore that, so there was nothing to hinder her. There, 
 don t you think I m always a-fault-finding ! When 
 I get hold of the real thing in folks, I stick to em, 
 but there s an awful sight of poor material walk 
 ing about that ain t worth the ground it steps on. 
 But when I look back a little ways, I can t blame 
 some of em ; though it does often seem as if people 
 might do better if they only set to work and tried. 
 
MISS DEBBY S^NEIGHBORS. 209 
 
 I must say I always do feel pleased when I think how 
 mad John was, this John s father, when he could 
 n t do just as he d a mind to with the pore old house. 
 I could n t help thinking of Joe s mansion, that he and 
 his father hauled down to the heater piece in the fork 
 of the roads. Sometimes I wonder where them Ash- 
 bys all went to. They d mistake one place for the 
 other in the next world, for t would make heaven 
 out o hell, because they could be disagreeing with 
 somebody, and well, I don t know, I m sure they 
 kep a good row going while they was in this world. 
 Only with mother ; somehow she could get along 
 with anybody, and not always give em their way 
 either." 
 
TOM S HUSBAND. 
 
 I SHALL not dwell long upon the circumstances 
 that led to the marriage of my hero and heroine ; 
 though their courtship was, to them, the only one 
 that has ever noticeably approached the ideal, it had 
 many aspects in which it was entirely commonplace 
 in other people s eyes. While the world in general 
 smiles at lovers with kindly approval and sympathy, 
 it refuses to be aware of the unprecedented delight 
 which is amazing to the lovers themselves. 
 
 But, as has been true in many other cases, when 
 they were at last married, the most ideal of situations 
 was found to have been changed to the most practi 
 cal. Instead of having shared their original duties, 
 and, as school-boys would say, going halves, they dis 
 covered that the cares of life had been doubled. This 
 led to some distressing moments for both our friends ; 
 they understood suddenly that instead of dwelling in 
 heaven they were still upon earth, and had made 
 themselves slaves to new laws and limitations. In- 
 
TOM S H&SBAND. 211 
 
 stead of being freer and happier than ever before, 
 they had assumed new responsibilities ; they had es 
 tablished a new household, and must fulfill in some 
 way or another the obligations of it. They looked 
 back with affection to their engagement ; they had 
 been longing to have each other to themselves, apart 
 from the world, but it seemed that they never felt so 
 keenly that they were still units in modern society. 
 Since Adam and Eve were in Paradise, before the 
 devil joined them, nobody has had a chance to imi 
 tate that unlucky couple. In some respects they told 
 the truth when, twenty times a day, they said that 
 life had never been so pleasant before ; but there 
 were mental reservations on either side which might 
 have subjected them to the accusation of lying. 
 Somehow, there was a little feeling of disappoint 
 ment, and they caught themselves wondering 
 though they would have died sooner than confess it 
 whether they were quite so happy as they had ex 
 pected. The truth was, they were much happier than 
 people usually are, for they had an uncommon capac 
 ity for enjoyment. For a little while they were like 
 a sail-boat that is beating and has to drift a few min 
 utes before it can catch the wind and start off on the 
 other tack. And they had the same feeling, too, that 
 any one is likely to have who has been long pursuing 
 
212 TOM S HUSBAND. 
 
 some object of his ambition or desire. Whether it is 
 a coin, or a picture, or a stray volume of some old 
 edition of Shakespeare, or whether it is an office un 
 der government or a lover, when fairly in one s grasp 
 there is a loss of the eagerness that was felt in pur 
 suit. Satisfaction, even after one has dined well, is 
 not so interesting and eager a feeling as hunger. 
 
 My hero and heroine were reasonably well estab 
 lished to begin with : they each had some money, 
 though Mr. Wilson had most. His father had at one 
 time been a rich man, but with the decline, a few 
 years before, of manufacturing interests, he had be 
 come, mostly through the fault of others, somewhat 
 involved ; and at the time of his death his affairs 
 were in such a condition that it was still a question 
 whether a very large sum or a moderately large one 
 would represent his estate. Mrs. Wilson, Tom s step 
 mother, was somewhat of an invalid ; she suffered 
 severely at times with asthma, but she was almost 
 entirely relieved by living in another part of the 
 country. While her husband lived, she had accepted 
 her illness as inevitable, and rarely left home ; but 
 during the last few years she had lived in Philadel 
 phia with her own people, making short and wheez 
 ing visits only from time to time, and had not under 
 gone a voluntary period of suffering since the occasion 
 
TOM S HtTSBAND. 213 
 
 of Tom s marriage, which she had entirely approved. 
 She had a sufficient property of her own, and she 
 and Tom were independent of each other in that 
 way. Her only other step-child was a daughter, who 
 had married a navy officer, and had at this time gone 
 out to spend three years (or less) with her husband, 
 who had been ordered to Japan. 
 
 It is not unfrequently noticed that in many mar 
 riages one of the persons who choose each other as 
 partners for life is said to have thrown himself or 
 herself away, and the relatives and friends look on 
 with dismal forebodings and ill-concealed submission. 
 In this case it was the wife who might have done so 
 much better, according to public opinion. She did 
 not think so herself, luckily, either before marriage 
 or afterward, and I do not think it occurred to her to 
 picture to herself the sort of career which would have 
 been her alternative. She had been an only child, 
 and had usually taken her own way. Some one once 
 said that it was a great pity that she had not been 
 obliged to work for her living, for she had inherited 
 a most uncommon business talent, and, without being 
 disreputably keen at a bargain, her insight into the 
 practical working of affairs was very clear and far- 
 reaching. Her father, who had also been a manufac 
 turer, like Tom s, had often said it had been a mistake 
 
214 TOM S HUSBAND. 
 
 that she was a girl instead of a boy. Such executive 
 ability as hers is often wasted in the more contracted 
 sphere of women, and is apt to be more a disadvan 
 tage than a help. She was too independent and self- 
 reliant for a wife ; it would seem at first thought that 
 she needed a wife herself more than she did a hus 
 band. Most men like best the women whose natures 
 cling and appeal to theirs for protection. But Tom 
 Wilson, while he did not wish to be protected him 
 self, liked these very qualities in his wife which 
 would have displeased some other men ; to tell the 
 truth, he was very much in love with his wife just as 
 she was. He was a successful collector of almost 
 everything but money, and during a great part of his 
 life he had been an invalid, and he had grown, as he 
 laughingly confessed, very old-womanish. He had 
 been badly lamed, when a boy, by being caught in 
 some machinery in his father s mill, near which he 
 was idling one afternoon, and though he had almost 
 entirely outgrown the effect of his injury, it had not 
 been until after many years. He had been in college, 
 but his eyes had given out there, and he had been 
 obliged to leave in the middle of his junior year, 
 though he had kept up a pleasant intercourse with 
 the members of his class, with whom he had been a 
 great favorite. He was a good deal of an idler in the 
 
TOM S Htf&BAND. 215 
 
 world. I do not think his ambition, except in the 
 case of securing Mary Dunn for his wife, had ever 
 been distinct ; he seemed to make the most he could 
 of each day as it came, without making all his days 
 works tend toward some grand result, and go to 
 ward the upbuilding of some grand plan and purpose. 
 He consequently gave no promise of being either dis 
 tinguished or great. When his eyes would allow, he 
 was an indefatigable reader ; and although he would 
 have said that he read only for amusement, yet he 
 amused himself with books that were well worth the 
 time he spent over them. 
 
 The house where he lived nominally belonged to 
 his step-mother, but she had taken for granted that 
 Tom would bring his wife home to it, and assured 
 him that it should be to all intents and purposes his. 
 Tom was deeply attached to the old place, which was 
 altogether the pleasantest in town. He had kept 
 bachelor s hall there most of the time since his father s 
 death, and he had taken great pleasure, before his 
 marriage, in refitting it to some extent, though it 
 was already comfortable and furnished in remarkably 
 good taste. People said of him that if it had not 
 been for his illnesses, and if he had been a poor boy, 
 he probably would have made something of himself. 
 As it was, he was not very well known by the towns- 
 
216 TOM S HUSBAND. 
 
 people, being somewhat reserved, and not taking 
 much interest in their every-day subjects of conversa 
 tion. Nobody liked him so well as they liked his 
 wife, yet there was no reason why he should be dis 
 liked enough to have much said about him. 
 
 After our friends had been married for some time, 
 and had outlived the first strangeness of the new 
 order of things, and had done their duty to their 
 neighbors with so much apparent willingness and 
 generosity that even Tom himself was liked a great 
 deal better than he ever had been before, they were 
 sitting together one stormy evening in the library, 
 before the fire. Mrs. Wilson had been reading Tom 
 the letters which had come to him by the night s 
 mail. There was a long one from his sister in Na 
 gasaki, which had been written with a good deal of 
 ill-disguised reproach. She complained of the small- 
 ness of the income of her share in her father s es 
 tate, and said that she had been assured by American 
 friends that the smaller mills were starting up every 
 where, and beginning to do well again. Since so 
 much of their money was invested in the factory, she 
 had been surprised and sorry to find by Tom s last 
 letters that he had seemed to have no idea of putting 
 in a proper person as superintendent, and going to 
 work again. Four per cent, on her other property, 
 
TOM 1 8 H&SBAND. 217 
 
 which she had been told she must soon expect in 
 stead of eight, would make a great difference to her. 
 A navy captain in a foreign port was obliged to enter 
 tain a great deal, and Tom must know that it cost 
 them much more to live than it did him, and ought 
 to think of their interests. She hoped he would talk 
 over what was best to be done with their mother 
 (who had been made executor, with Tom, of his fa 
 ther s will). 
 
 Tom laughed a little, but looked disturbed. His 
 wife had said something to the same effect, and his 
 mother had spoken once or twice in her letters of 
 the prospect of starting the mill again. He was not 
 a bit of a business man, and he did not feel certain, 
 with the theories which he had arrived at of the state 
 of the country, that it was safe yet to spend the 
 money which would have to be spent in putting the 
 mill in order. " They think that the minute it is go 
 ing again we shall be making money hand over hand, 
 just as father did when we were children," he said. 
 " It is going to cost us no end of money before we 
 can make anything. Before father died he meant to 
 put in a good deal of new machinery, I remember. 
 I don t know anything about the business myself, and 
 I would have sold out long ago if I had had an of 
 fer that came anywhere near the value. The larger 
 
218 TOM S HUSBAND. 
 
 mills are the only ones that are good for anything 
 now, and we should have to bring a crowd of French 
 Canadians here ; the day is past for the people who 
 live in this part of the country to go into the factory 
 again. Even the Irish all go West when they come 
 into the country, and don t come to places like this 
 any more." 
 
 " But there are a good many of the old work-peo 
 ple down in the village," said Mrs. Wilson. " Jack 
 Towne asked me the other day if you were n t going 
 to start up in the spring." 
 
 Tom moved uneasily in his chair. " I 11 put you 
 in for superintendent, if you like," he said, half an 
 grily, whereupon Mary threw the newspaper at him; 
 but by the time he had thrown it back he was in 
 good humor again. 
 
 " Do you know, Tom," she said, with amazing 
 seriousness, " that I believe I should like nothing in 
 the world so much as to be the head of a large busi 
 ness ? I hate keeping house, I always did ; and 
 I never did so much of it in all my life put together 
 as I have since I have been married. I suppose it 
 is n t womanly to say so, but if I could escape from 
 the whole thing I believe I should be perfectly happy. 
 If you get rich when the mill is going again, I shall 
 beg for a housekeeper, and shirk everything. I give 
 
TO^f>S HUSBAND. 219 
 
 you fair warning. I don t believe I keep this house 
 half so well as you did before I came here." 
 
 Tom s eyes twinkled. " I am going to have that 
 glory, I don t think you do, Polly ; but you can t 
 say that I have not been forbearing. I certainly 
 have not told you more than twice how we used to 
 have things cooked. I m not going to be your 
 kitchen-colonel." 
 
 " Of course it seemed the proper thing to do," said 
 his wife, meditatively ; " but I think we should have 
 been even happier than we have if I had been spared 
 it. I have had some days of wretchedness that I 
 shudder to think of. I never know what to have for 
 breakfast ; and I ought not to say it, but I don t 
 mind the sight of dust. I look upon housekeeping 
 as my life s great discipline ; " and at this pathetic 
 confession they both laughed heartily. 
 
 " I ve a great mind to take it off your hands," 
 said Tom. " I always rather liked it, to tell the 
 truth, and I ought to be a better housekeeper, I 
 have been at it for five years ; though housekeeping 
 for one is different from what it is for two, and one 
 of them a woman. You see you have brought a dif 
 ferent element into my family. Luckily, the serv 
 ants are pretty well drilled. I do think you upset 
 them a good deal at first ! " 
 
220 TOM S HUSBAND. 
 
 Mary Wilson smiled as if she only half heard what 
 he was saying. She drummed with her foot on the 
 floor and looked intently at the fire, and presently 
 gave it a vigorous poking. " Well ? " said Tom, after 
 he had waited patiently as long as he could. 
 
 " Tom ! I m going to propose something to you. 
 I wish you would really do as you said, and take all 
 the home affairs under your care, and let me start 
 the mill. I am certain I could manage it. Of course 
 I should get people who understood the thing to teach 
 me. I believe I was made for it ; I should like it 
 above all things. And this is what I will do : I will 
 bear the cost of starting it, myself, I think I have 
 money enough, or can get it ; and if I have not put 
 affairs in the right trim at the end of a year I will 
 stop, and you may make some other arrangement. If 
 I have, you and your mother and sister can pay me 
 back." 
 
 " So I am going to be the wife, and you the hus 
 band," said Tom, a little indignantly ; " at least, that 
 is what people will say. It s a regular Darby and 
 Joan affair, and you think you can do more work in 
 a day than I can do in three. Do you know that 
 you must go to town to buy cotton ? And do you 
 know there are a thousand things about it that you 
 don t know ? " 
 
TOM S HUSBAND. 221 
 
 " And never will ? " said Mary, with perfect good 
 humor " Why, Tom, I can learn as well as you, 
 and a good deal better, for I like business, and you 
 don t. You forget that I was always father s right- 
 hand man after I was a dozen years old, and that you 
 have let me invest my money and some of your own, 
 and I have n t made a blunder yet." 
 
 Tom thought that his wife had never looked so 
 handsome or so happy. " I don t care, I should 
 rather like the fun of knowing what people will say. 
 It is a new departure, at any rate. Women think 
 they can do everything- better than men in these 
 days, but I m the first man, apparently, who has 
 wished he were a woman." 
 
 " Of course people will laugh," said Mary, " but 
 they will say that it s just like me, and think I am 
 fortunate to have married a man who will let me do 
 as I choose. I don t see why it is n t sensible : you 
 will be living exactly as you were before you mar 
 ried, as to home affairs ; and since it was a good 
 thing for you to know something about housekeeping 
 then, I can t imagine why you should n t go on with 
 it now, since it makes me miserable, and I am wast 
 ing a fine business talent while I do it. What do we 
 care for people s talking about it ? " 
 
 " It seems to me that it is something like women s 
 
222 TOM S HUSBAND. 
 
 smoking : it is n t wicked, but it is n t the custom of 
 the country. And I don t like the idea of your go 
 ing among business men. Of course I should be 
 above going with you, and having people think I 
 must be an idiot ; they would say that you married 
 a manufacturing interest, and I was thrown in. I 
 can foresee that my pride is going to be humbled to 
 the dust in every way," Tom declared in mournful 
 tones, and began to shake with laughter. " It is one 
 of your lovely castles in the air, dear Polly, but an 
 old brick mill needs a better foundation than the 
 clouds. No, I 11 look around, and get an honest, ex 
 perienced man for agent. I suppose it s the best 
 thing we can do, for the machinery ought not to lie 
 still any longer ; but I mean to sell the factory as 
 soon as I can. I devoutly wish it would take fire, 
 for the insurance would be the best price we are 
 likely to get. That is a famous letter from Alice ! 
 I am afraid the captain has been growling over his 
 pay, or they have been giving too many little dinners 
 on board ship. If we were rid of the mill, you and 
 I might go out there this winter. It would be cap 
 ital fun." 
 
 Mary smiled again in an absent-minded way. Tom 
 had an uneasy feeling that he had not heard the end 
 of it yet, but nothing more was said for a day or two. 
 
TOM S B&SBAND. 223 
 
 When Mrs. Tom Wilson announced, with no ap 
 parent thought of being contradicted, that she had 
 entirely made up her mind, and she meant to see 
 those men who had been overseers of the different 
 departments, who still lived in the village, and have 
 the mill put in order at once, Tom looked disturbed, 
 but made no opposition ; and soon after breakfast his 
 wife formally presented him with a handful of keys, 
 and told him there was some lamb in the house for 
 dinner ; and presently he heard the wheels of her 
 little phaeton rattling off down the road. I should 
 be untruthful if I tried to persuade any one that he 
 was not provoked ; he thought she would at least 
 have waited for his formal permission, and at first he 
 meant to take another horse, and chase her, and bring 
 her back in disgrace, and put a stop to the whole 
 thing. But something assured him that she knew 
 what she was about, and he determined to let her 
 have her own way. If she failed, it might do no 
 harm, and this was the only ungallant thought he 
 gave her. He was sure that she would do nothing 
 unladylike, or be unmindful of his dignity ; and he 
 believed it would be looked upon as one of her odd, 
 independent freaks, which always had won respect in 
 the end, however much they had been laughed at in 
 the beginning. " Susan," said he, as that estimable 
 
224 TOM S HUSBAND. 
 
 person went by the door with the dust-pan, " you 
 may tell Catherine to come to me for orders about 
 the house, and you may do so yourself. I am going 
 to take charge again, as I did before I was married. 
 It is no trouble to me, and Mrs. Wilson dislikes it. 
 Besides, she is going into business, and will have a 
 great deal else to think of." 
 
 "Yes, sir; very well, sir," said Susan, who was 
 suddenly moved to ask so many questions that she 
 was utterly silent. But her master looked very 
 happy ; there was evidently no disapproval of his 
 wife ; and she went on up the stairs, and began to 
 sweep them down, knocking the dust-brush about ex 
 citedly, as if she were trying to kill a descending 
 colony of insects. 
 
 Tom went out to the stable and mounted his horse, 
 which had been waiting for him to take his customary 
 after-breakfast ride to the post-office, and he galloped 
 down the road in quest of the phaeton. He saw 
 Mary talking with Jack Towne, who had been an 
 overseer and a valued workman of his father s. He 
 was looking much surprised and pleased. 
 
 " I was n t caring so much about getting work, 
 myself," he explained ; " I ve got what will carry 
 me and my wife through ; but it 11 be better for the 
 young folks about here to work near home. My 
 
TOM S JTUSBAND. 225 
 
 nephews are wanting something to do ; they were 
 going to Lynn next week. I don t say but I should 
 like to be to work in the old place again. I ve sort 
 of missed it, since we shut down." 
 
 " I m sorry I was so long in overtaking you," said 
 Tom, politely, to his wife. " Well, Jack, did Mrs. 
 Wilson tell you she s going to start the mill ? You 
 must give her all the help you can." 
 
 " Deed I will," said Mr. Tovvne, gallantly, with 
 out a bit of astonishment. 
 
 " I don t know much about the business yet," said 
 Mrs. Wilson, who had been a little overcome at Jack 
 Towne s lingo of the different rooms and machinerjr, 
 and who felt an overpowering sense of having a great 
 deal before her in the next few weeks. " By the 
 time the mill is ready, I will be ready, too," she said, 
 taking heart a little ; and Tom, who was quick to 
 understand her moods, could not help laughing, as he 
 rode alongside. " We want a new barrel of flour, 
 Tom, dear," she said, by way of punishment for his 
 untimely mirth. 
 
 If she lost courage in the long delay, or was dis 
 heartened at the steady call for funds, she made no 
 sign ; and after a while the mill started up, and her 
 cares were lightened, so that she told Tom that be 
 fore next pay day she would like to go to Boston for 
 15 
 
226 TOM S HUSBAND. 
 
 a few days, and go to the theatre, and have a frolic 
 and a rest. She really looked pale and thin, and she 
 said she never worked so hard in all her life ; but 
 nobody knew how happy she was, and she was so 
 glad she had married Tom, for some men would have 
 
 7 
 
 laughed at it. 
 
 " I laughed at it," said Tom, meekly. " All is, if 
 
 1 don t cry by and by, because I am a beggar, I shall 
 be lucky." But Mary looked fearlessly serene, and 
 said that there was no danger at present. 
 
 It would have been ridiculous to expect a dividend 
 the first year, though the Nagasaki people were paci 
 fied with difficulty. All the business letters came to 
 Tom s address, and everybody who was not directly 
 concerned thought that he was the motive power of 
 the reawakened enterprise. Sometimes business peo 
 ple came to the mill, and were amazed at having to 
 confer with Mrs. Wilson, but they soon had to re 
 spect her talents and her success. She was helped 
 by the old clerk, who had been promptly recalled and 
 reinstated, and she certainly did capitally well. She 
 was laughed at, as she had expected to be, and peo 
 ple said they should think Tom would be ashamed of 
 himself ; but it soon appeared that he was not to 
 blame, arid what reproach was offered was on the 
 score of his wife s oddity. There was nothing about 
 
TOM S HUSBAND. 227 
 
 the mill that she did not understand before very long, 
 and at the end of the second year she declared a 
 small dividend with great pride and triumph. And 
 she was congratulated on her success, and every one 
 thought of her project in a different way from the 
 way they had thought of it in the beginning. She 
 had singularly good fortune : at the end of the third 
 year she was making money for herself and her 
 friends faster than most people were, and approving 
 letters began to come from Nagasaki. The Ashtons 
 had been ordered to stay in that region, and it was 
 evident that they were continually being obliged to 
 entertain more instead of less. Their children were 
 growing fast, too, and constantly becoming more ex 
 pensive. The captain and his wife had already be 
 gun to congratulate themselves secretly that their 
 two sons would in all probability come into posses 
 sion, one day, of their uncle Tom s handsome prop 
 erty. 
 
 For a good while Tom enjoyed life, and went on 
 his quiet way serenely. He was anxious at first, for 
 he thought that Mary was going to make ducks and 
 drakes of his money and her own. And then he did 
 not exactly like the looks of the thing, either ; he 
 feared that his wife was growing successful as a busi 
 ness person at the risk of losing her womanliness. 
 
228 TOM S HUSBAND. 
 
 But as time went on, and he found there was no fear 
 of that, he accepted the situation philosophically. He 
 gave up his collection of engravings, having become 
 more interested in one of coins and medals, which 
 took up most of his leisure time. He often went to 
 the city in pursuit of such treasures, and gained much 
 renown in certain quarters as a numismatologist of 
 great skill and experience. But at last his house 
 (which had almost kept itself, and had given him lit 
 tle to do beside ordering the dinners, while faithful 
 old Catherine and her niece Susan were his aids) sud 
 denly became a great care to him. Catherine, who 
 had been the main-stay of the family for many years, 
 died after a short illness, and Susan must needs 
 choose that time, of all others, for being married to 
 one of the second hands in the mill. There followed 
 a long and dismal season of experimenting, and for a 
 time there was a procession of incapable creatures go 
 ing in at one kitchen door and out of the other. His 
 wife would not have liked to say so, but it seemed to 
 her that Tom was growing fussy about the house af 
 fairs, and took more notice of those minor details 
 than he used. She wished more than once, when she 
 was tired, that he would not talk so much about the 
 housekeeping ; he seemed sometimes to have no other 
 thought 
 
TOM 1 8 HUSBAND. 229 
 
 In the early days of Mrs. Wilson s business life, 
 she had made it a rule to consult her husband on 
 every subject of importance ; but it had speedily 
 proved to be a formality. Tom tried manfully to show 
 a deep interest which he did not feel, and his wife 
 gave up, little by little, telling him much about her 
 affairs. She said that she liked to drop business when 
 ghe came home in the evening ; and at last she fell 
 into the habit of taking a nap on the library sofa, 
 while Tom, who could not use his eyes much by 
 lamp-light, sat smoking or in utter idleness before 
 the fire. When they were first married his wife had 
 made it a rule that she should always read him the 
 evening papers, and afterward they had always gone 
 on with some book of history or philosophy, in which 
 they were both interested. These evenings of their 
 early married life had been charming to both of them, 
 and from time to time one would say to the other 
 that they ought to take up again the habit of reading 
 together. Mary was so unaffectedly tired in the even 
 ing that Tom never liked to propose a walk ; for, 
 though he was not a man of peculiarly social nature, 
 he had always been accustomed to pay an occasional 
 evening visit to his neighbors in the village. And 
 though he had little interest in the business world, 
 and still less knowledge of it, after a while he wished 
 
230 TOM S HUSBAND. 
 
 that his wife would have more to say about what she 
 was planning and doing, or how things were getting 
 on. He thought that her chief aid, old Mr. Jackson, 
 was far more in her thoughts than he. She was for 
 ever quoting Jackson s opinions. He did not like to 
 find that she took it for granted that he was not in 
 terested in the welfare of his own property ; it made 
 him feel like a sort of pensioner and dependent, 
 though, when they had guests at the house, which 
 was by no means seldom, there was nothing in her 
 manner that would imply that she thought herself in 
 any way the head of the family. It was hard work 
 to find fault with his wife in any way, though, to 
 give him his due, he rarely tried. 
 
 But, this being a wholly unnatural state of things, 
 the reader must expect to hear of its change at last, 
 and the first blow from the enemy was dealt by an 
 old woman, who lived near by, and who called to 
 Tom one morning, as he was driving down to the 
 village in a great hurry (to post a letter, which or 
 dered his agent to secure a long-wished-for ancient 
 copper coin, at any price), to ask him if they had 
 made yeast that week, and if she could borrow a cup 
 ful, as her own had met with some misfortune. Tom 
 was instantly in a rage, and he mentally condemned 
 
TOM S HUSBAND. 231 
 
 her to some undeserved fate, but told her aloud to go 
 and see the cook. This slight delay, besides being 
 killing to his dignity, caused him to lose the mail, 
 and in the end his much-desired copper coin. It was 
 a hard day for him, altogether ; it was Wednesday, 
 and the first days of the week having been stormy 
 the washing was very late. And Mary came home to 
 dinner provokingly good-natured. She had met an 
 old school-mate and her husband driving home from 
 the mountains, and had first taken them over her fac 
 tory, to their great amusement and delight, and then 
 had brought them home to dinner. Tom greeted 
 them cordially, and manifested his usual graceful hos 
 pitality ; but the minute he saw his wife alone he said 
 in a plaintive tone of rebuke, " I should think you 
 might have remembered that the servants are unusu- 
 
 o 
 
 ally busy to-day. I do wish you would take a little 
 interest in things at home. The women have been 
 washing, and I m sure I don t know what sort of a 
 dinner we can give your friends. I wish you had 
 thought to bring home some steak. I have been 
 busy myself, and could n t go down to the village. I 
 thought we would only have a lunch." 
 
 Mary was hungry, but she said nothing, except 
 that it would be all right, she didn t mind; and 
 perhaps they could have some canned soup. 
 
232 TOM S HUSBAND. 
 
 She often went to town to buy or look at cotton, 
 or to see some improvement in machinery, and she 
 brought home beautiful bits of furniture and new pic 
 tures for the house, and showed a touching thought- 
 fulness in remembering Tom s fancies ; but somehow 
 he had an uneasy suspicion that she could get along 
 pretty well without him when it came to the deeper 
 wishes and hopes of her life, and that her most im 
 portant concerns were all matters in which he had no 
 share. He seemed to himself to have merged his 
 
 o 
 
 life in his wife s ; he lost his interest in things out. 
 side the house and grounds ; he felt himself fast 
 growing rusty and behind the times, and to have 
 somehow missed a good deal in life ; he had a sus 
 picion that he was a failure. One day the thought 
 rushed over him that his had been almost exactly 
 the experience of most women, and he wondered if 
 it really was any more disappointing and ignominious 
 to him than it was to women themselves. u Some of 
 them may be contented with it," he said to himself, 
 soberly. " People think women are designed for 
 such careers by nature, but I don t know why I ever 
 made such a fool of myself." 
 
 Having once seen his situation in life from such a 
 stand-point, he felt it day by day to be more degrad 
 ing, and he wondered what he should do about it ; 
 
TOM S HUSBAND. 233 
 
 and once, drawn by a new, strange sympathy, he 
 went to the little family burying-ground. It was one 
 of the mild, dim days that come sometimes in early 
 November, when the pale sunlight is like the pathetic 
 smile of a sad face, and he sat for a long time on the 
 limp, frost-bitten grass beside his mother s grave. 
 
 But when he went home in the twilight his step 
 mother, who just then was making them a little visit, 
 mentioned that she had been looking through some 
 boxes of hers that had been packed long before and 
 stowed away in the garret. " Everything looks very 
 nice up there," she said, in her wheezing voice (which, 
 worse than usual that day, always made him nerv 
 ous) ; and added, without any intentional slight to 
 his feelings, " I do think you have always been a 
 most excellent housekeeper." 
 
 " I m tired of such nonsense ! " he exclaimed, with 
 surprising indignation. " Mary, I wish you to ar 
 range your affairs so that you can leave them for six 
 months at least. I am going to spend this winter in 
 Europe." 
 
 " Why, Tom, dear ! " said his wife, appealingly. 
 " I could n t leave my business any way in the " 
 
 But she caught sight of a look on his usually placid 
 countenance that was something more than decision, 
 and refrained from saying anything more. 
 
 And three weeks from that day they sailed. 
 
THE CONFESSION OF A HOUSE- 
 BKEAKER. 
 
 THIS confession differs from that of most criminals 
 who are classed under the same head ; for whereas 
 house-breakers usually break into houses, I broke 
 out. It was not a difficult exit, for there was no 
 glass to be broken, nor any occasion for a burglar s 
 tool-box. The truth is that one night, lately, I could 
 not sleep, and when the eastern sky began to show 
 a tinge of light I seated myself by the window ; and 
 by the time the clocks and bells of the neighborhood 
 struck three, I became possessed by a desire to go 
 out-of-doors to watch the coming of the June morn 
 ing, and to see the world before the sun himself did, 
 arid to hear the matins of the birds from beginning to 
 end, because I had been at best an unpunctual wor 
 shiper at this service. An occasional early waking 
 or late falling asleep had given me a fragment of the 
 music ; but it was much like the way a foreign tour 
 ist saunters idly in at the door of a cathedral while 
 mass is being performed. 
 
THE CONFESSION OF A HOUSE-BREAKER. 235 
 
 So after I had leaned out of my eastern window 
 for a few minutes longer, and had heard one sleepy 
 note from the top of an elm not far away, I dressed 
 myself hurriedly, and took my boots in my hand, and 
 prepared to escape. It was no easy matter, for I be 
 long to a household of light sleepers, who are quick 
 to hear an untimely footfall. I stole carefully by the 
 open doors and down the stairs, remembering fear 
 fully that one was apt to creak, and I hardly took a 
 long breath until I found myself out in the garden. 
 
 It was startlingly dark under the trees, and the 
 alarmed shadows appeared to be hovering there as if 
 to discuss the next move, and to find shelter mean 
 while. A bat went by me suddenly, and at that I 
 stood still. I had not thought of bats, and of all 
 creatures they seem most frightful and unearthly, 
 like the flutter of a ghost s mantle, or even the wave 
 and touch of its hand. A bat by daylight is a harm 
 less, crumpled bit of stupidity ; but by night it be 
 comes a creature of mystery and horror, an attendant 
 of the powers of darkness. The white light in the 
 sky grew whiter still, and under the thin foliage of a 
 great willow it seemed less solemn. A bright little 
 waning moon looked down through the slender twigs 
 and fine leaves, it might have been a new moon 
 watching me through an olive-tree ; but I caught the 
 
236 THE CONFESSION OF A HOUSE-BREAKER. 
 
 fragrance of the flowers, and hurried toward them. I 
 went back and forth along the garden walks, and I 
 can never tell any one how beautiful it was. The 
 roses were all in bloom, and presently I could detect 
 the different colors. They were wet with dew, and 
 hung heavy with their weight of perfume ; they ap 
 peared to be sound asleep yet, and turned their faces 
 away after I had touched them. 
 
 Some of the flowers were wide awake, however. 
 One never knows the grace and beauty of white 
 petunias until they have been seen at night, or, like 
 this, early in the morning. It is when the dew has 
 fallen that this delicate flower and mignonette also 
 give out their best fragrance ; and if one is lucky 
 enough to be able to add the old-fashioned honey 
 suckle his garden is odorous indeed. Roses need 
 the sunshine to bring out their full beauties, though 
 when I held my face close to the great wet clusters 
 it seemed to me that I had taken all their store of 
 perfume for the coming day in one long, delicious 
 breath. The white flowers looked whiter still in the 
 pale light, and the taller bushes were like draped 
 figures ; and suddenly I was reminded, nobody knows 
 why, of a long walk with some friends through the 
 damp avenues of Versailles, when the leaves were 
 beginning to fall, and the garden of the Little 
 
THE CONFESSION OF A HOUSE-BREAKER. 237 
 
 Trianon was gay with blossoms. I remembered most 
 vividly how warm the sunshine was upon the ter 
 races ; how empty and silent the pathetic holiday 
 rooms ; how we strained our eyes to catch sight of 
 the ghosts who must be flitting before us, and trying 
 to keep out of sight, lest one of us might be a seer of 
 spirits, and might intrude upon their peaceful exist 
 ence. If there were a little noise in the court-yard, 
 I thought it was the merry servants of a hundred 
 years ago, busy with their every-day duties. The 
 scent of the petunias and geraniums and mignonette 
 was filling all the air. We were only stealing in 
 while the tenants of the house were sleeping, or were 
 away in Paris ; we had not even a fear or suspicion 
 of their sorry end. It was a strange jumble of remi 
 niscences, personal and historical, that flitted through 
 my mind, as I went walking slowly up and down my 
 own New England garden, among the roses, in the 
 middle of the night. 
 
 I could not say it was the middle of the night, or 
 still less the dead of night, and have any respect for 
 myself as a truth-teller. It had suddenly become 
 morning. I sat down on one of the garden benches, 
 and watched and listened. A pewee began a prelude 
 - somewhat despairingly and without enthusiasm, and 
 the song-sparrows tried to cheer him, or at least to 
 
238 THE CONFESSION OF A HOUSE-BREAKER. 
 
 make him hurry a little. The bobolinks tuned up, 
 and the golden robins ; and presently the solos were 
 over, and the grand chorus began. One joyful robin, 
 who had posted himself on the corner of a roof where 
 I could see him, seemed to have constituted himself 
 leader of the choir, and sang and sang, until I feared 
 for his dear life; one would have thought he had 
 reached bird-heaven before his time. It must have 
 been the dawn of a long-looked-for day with him, at 
 any rate, he was so glad to have it come at last. I 
 remembered the young English soldier whom Howells 
 saw at daybreak in Venice, and I hoped that I should 
 know in another world how my robin liked the day s 
 pleasure, after all. 
 
 I became very neighborly with a sober-minded toad, 
 that gave an eager scramble from among the flower- 
 de-luces, and then sat still on the gravel walk, blink 
 ing and looking at me, as if he had made plans for sit 
 ting on the garden bench, and I was giving him great 
 inconvenience. He was a philosopher, that fellow ; he 
 sat and thought about it, and made his theories about 
 me and about the uncertainty of temporal things. I 
 dare say he comes out every morning, and looks up 
 at the bench, and considers his ambitions and the ad 
 verse powers that thwart them, in common with many 
 of his fellow-creatures. 
 
THE CONFESSION OF A HOUSE-BREAKER. 239 
 
 The colors of the world grew brighter and brighter. 
 The outline of the trees, and of some distant fields 
 even, became distinct ; yet it was a strange, almost 
 uncanny light, it was more like looking through 
 clear water, and I still expected something out of 
 the ordinary course to happen. I was not continuing 
 my thoughts and plans of the day before, though 
 suddenly I became conscious that one of my friends 
 was awake, and an understanding between us sprang 
 up quickly, like a flame on the altar to Friendship, 
 in my heart. It was pleasant, after all, to have hu 
 man companionship, and it was difficult to persuade 
 myself that the mysterious telegraph between my 
 friend and me measured so many miles. I thought of 
 one and another remote acquaintance after this, but 
 only the first was awake and watching at that strange 
 hour ; the rest slept soundly, and with something ap 
 proaching clairvoyance I fancied that I could see 
 their sleeping faces arid their unconsciousness, as I 
 looked into one shaded room after another. How 
 wonderful the courage is which lets us lie down to 
 sleep unquestioningly, night after night, and even 
 wait and wish for it ! We have a horror of the drugs 
 that simulate its effect ; we think we are violating 
 and tampering with the laws of nature, and make the 
 false sleep a last resource in illness or a sinful self- 
 
240 THE CONFESSION OF A HOUSE-BREAKER. 
 
 indulgence. But in the real sleep, what comes to 
 us ? What change and restoration and growth to 
 the mind and soul matches the physical rest which 
 does us good and makes us strong ? He giveth to his 
 beloved while sleeping, is the true rendering from the 
 Psalms. 
 
 No wonder that in the early days a thousand follies 
 and fables and legends were based on the dreams and 
 mysteries of sleep. No wonder that we gain confi 
 dence to approach the last sleep of all, since we find 
 ourselves alive again morning by morning. And as 
 for the bewildered state into which some of us fall in 
 our later years, is not that like a long darkness and 
 drowsiness, from which the enfeebled mind and body 
 cannot rouse themselves until the brightest of all 
 mornings dawns ? 
 
 The ranks of flowers in my garden took on a great 
 splendor of bloom, as the light grew clearer. After 
 having watched them fade in the gray ness of many 
 an evening twilight, it was most lovely to see how 
 the veil was lifted again at daybreak. It seemed as 
 if the quiet June morning ushered in some grand 
 festival day, there were such preparations being made. 
 After the roses, the London pride was most gorgeous 
 to behold, with its brilliant red and its tall, straight 
 stalks. It had a soldierly appearance, as if the flower 
 
THE CONFESSION OF ^ HOUSE-BREAKER. 241 
 
 were out early to keep guard. Twice as many birds 
 as one ever sees in the day-time were scurrying 
 fearlessly through the air, as though they were late 
 to breakfast, at any rate, and had a crowd of duties 
 to attend to afterward. The grand chorus was over 
 with, though a number of songsters of various kinds 
 kept on with their parts, as if they stayed to practice 
 a while after service, though the rest of the choris 
 ters had thrown off their surplices and hurried away. 
 
 I had a desire to go out farther into the world, and 
 I went some distance up the street, past my neigh 
 bors house ; feeling a sense of guilt and secrecy that 
 could hardly be matched. It had been one thing to 
 walk about my own garden, and even to cross the 
 field at the foot of it to say good-morning to a row of 
 elm-trees and the robins in their tops, of which inci 
 dent I forgot to speak in its proper place. But if 
 any one had suddenly hailed me from a window I 
 should have been inclined to run home as fast as my 
 feet could carry me. In such fashion are we bound 
 to the conventionalities of existence ! 
 
 But it seemed most wonderful to be awake while 
 everybody slept, and to have the machinery of life 
 apparently set in motion for my benefit alone. The 
 toad had been a comfort, and the thought of my 
 friend even more, if one will believe it ; and besides 
 
 1C 
 
242 THE CONFESSION OF A HOUSE-BREAKER. 
 
 these, I had become very intimate with a poppy, 
 which had made every arrangement to bloom as soon 
 as the sun rose. As I walked farther and farther 
 from home I felt more and more astray, and as if I 
 were taking an unfair advantage of the rest of hu 
 manity. In one house I saw a lamp burning, the 
 light of it paling gradually, and my glimpse of the 
 room gave me a feeling of sadness. It was piteous 
 that no one should know that the night was over, and 
 it was day again. It was like the flicker of the lamp 
 at a shrine, an undying flame that can lighten the 
 darkness neither of death nor of life ; a feeble pro 
 test against the inevitable night, and the shadows 
 that no man can sweep away. 
 
 A little child cried drearily in a chamber where the 
 blinds were shut, a tired wail, as if the night had 
 been one of illness, and the morning brought no re 
 lief. A great dog lay sleeping soundly in the yard, 
 as if he would not waken for three hours yet. I 
 know him well, good fellow, and I had a tempta 
 tion to speak to him, to see his surprise ; and yet I 
 had not a good excuse. He would simply wonder 
 what made the day so long afterward ; and I turned 
 towards home again, lest some other house-breaker 
 might go in where I had come out. A belated pewee, 
 who appeared to have overslept himself, piped up 
 
THE CONFESSION OF & HOUSE-BREAKER. 243 
 
 his plaintive morning song, and the pigeons, who are 
 famous sleepy-heads, began to coo and croon, as if 
 they were trying to get themselves to sleep again. 
 The cocks crowed again once or twice apiece all over 
 town, and it was time to go home. The spell of the 
 dawn was lifted ; and though I could not resist leaping 
 the front fence instead of opening the gate for my 
 self, I was a little dismayed afterward at such singular 
 conduct, and took pains to look up and down the 
 street, to make sure there were no startled passers-by. 
 The house was still dark, and it seemed hot after 
 the dew and freshness of the out-of-door air ; but I 
 locked the door carefully, and stole up-stairs. The 
 east was gorgeous with yellow clouds ; the belated 
 pewee was trying to make up for lost time. I heard 
 somebody in the next room give a long sigh, as if of 
 great comfort, and I shut out the dazzling light of 
 the sun, and went to bed again. Presently I heard 
 the mill-bells up and down the river ring out their 
 early call to the tired housekeepers, and I thought it 
 was a reluctant rather than a merry peal ; and then I 
 said to myself something about to-morrow no, it is 
 to-day yes but this was daylight that was neither 
 to-morrow s nor yesterday s. And so I fell asleep, 
 like all the rest of the world, to wake again some 
 hours later, as much delighted and puzzled with my 
 morning ramble as if it had been a dream. 
 
A LITTLE TKAVELEK. 
 
 THE day I met this little friend of mine (whom I 
 never shall forget) I had just left some other friends, 
 and I was sorry that my pleasant visit to them was 
 over. I had a long journey to take before I reached 
 home, and I was to take it alone. I did not mind 
 this, in one way, for I had grown used to traveling 
 by myself. I was lucky in having a most comfortable 
 section in the sleeping-car, and I was well provided 
 with books and lunch and pleasant thoughts. So, 
 after I had looked out of the window for half an 
 hour, I began to settle myself comfortably for the 
 day or two I must spend in the train. There were 
 several passengers, but no one whom I had ever 
 seen before, and it was some time before I lost the 
 feeling that I was with a company of unknown people, 
 and began to take an interest in my fellow travelers 
 separately. There was the usual young couple in 
 very new clothes who tried to make us believe that 
 they had been married these ten years, and there were 
 
A LITTLE TRAVELER 245 
 
 two comfortable elderly women who knew each other 
 and were journeying together, loudly talking over 
 parish and neighborhood matters by the way. Not far 
 from me was a round, red-cheeked old lady in a some 
 what fantastic dress, with a big bonnet all covered 
 with ends of narrow ribbon and lustreless bugles. I 
 am sure she had made it herself and was proud and 
 conscious of it. She had a great deal of small lug 
 gage in the compartment with her, and I thought she 
 must be changing her home, for she never could be 
 taking away so many and such curious looking pack 
 ages just for a visit. Beside these people there were 
 four or five business men and a Catholic priest, and 
 just opposite my own place was a little girl. 
 
 For some time I supposed she must belong to some 
 one in the car, and had chosen to sit by herself for a 
 while and look out of the window. Then I thought 
 her father must have left her to go to some other part 
 of the train where he had found some one to talk 
 with. But two hours went by, and it was toward 
 noon, and I watched the little thing grow sleepy and 
 at last put her head down on the seat, and the doll 
 she had held so carefully slid to the floor. I picked 
 it up and put it on her arm again so she might find it 
 when she waked. I had noticed that the conductor 
 had spoken to her and I thought I would ask him 
 about her when he next came by. 
 
246 A LITTLE TRAVELER. 
 
 She did not sleep very long ; the stopping of the 
 train startled her, and when she opened her eyes I 
 smiled at her and beckoned her to conie to me. So 
 she climbed the seat beside me, still holding the doll, 
 and I asked her what its name was, and if she were 
 all alone, and where she was going. She looked up 
 gravely into my face and told me the doll s name and 
 her own, and then she did not say anything more. 
 She was younger than I had thought at first, and 
 yet she was grave and sober and saddened. " Is n t 
 your papa with you ? " said I, but she only shook 
 her head and looked up at me again as she sat beside 
 me. I was strangely drawn to the little thing, she 
 puzzled me, and she was so wistful. She seemed 
 contented, and we both looked out of the window, 
 and talked now and then about the things we saw. 
 She sat in my lap so she could see better. 
 
 After some time she said to me, " Mother is dead," 
 in a half-questioning way, as if she expected me to 
 say something ; but what could I say, except that I 
 was sorry ? though there was all that wonder in 
 her face at having been brought in contact with so 
 great a mystery. This new, undreamed-of, uncom 
 fortable change was almost too much for her mind to 
 recognize at all, but she had been shocked by it, and 
 everything was different from what it used to be. 
 She knew that at any rate. 
 
A LITTLE TRAVELER. 247 
 
 " She said she was going to die," the child told me, 
 still watching me with her sad and curious eyes as if 
 everybody knew the secret of it all and would not 
 tell her. 
 
 " You will know all about it when you are older, 
 dear, and you will see her again by and by," I said ; 
 but she shook her head. 
 
 " She is n t coming back any more," she answered, 
 as if she were sure of that at any rate. 
 
 There seemed to be no one to look after her, so 
 presently I gave her some of my own luncheon. She 
 was very hungry, and I pitied her more than ever, 
 for the fact of her friendlessness grew more and 
 more plain. She had pretty manners; she evidently 
 had been brought up carefully, and there was a 
 quaint dignity and reserve about her; she did noth 
 ing in a hurry, as if she had never been with other 
 children at all and had learned no childish or im 
 patient ways. I noticed her clothes, which were be 
 ginning to look worn and outgrown, but were very 
 clean and well kept. Tt was on the edge of winter, 
 but she still wore what must have been her last sum 
 mer s hat, a little leghorn hat trimmed with white 
 ribbon, and over her shoulders she had one of the 
 very smallest of plaid shawls folded corner wise, and 
 pinned over neatly. She had some mittens, but she 
 
248 A LITTLE TRAVELER. 
 
 had taken those off and put them together on the 
 window ledge. 
 
 Presently the conductor came in, evidently in a 
 hurry, and when he saw that we had been lunching 
 together he looked as if a weight were taken off his 
 mind. 
 
 " I m very much obliged to you," he said to me ; 
 " I meant to take her out and give her some dinner 
 when we stopped, but I got a message that something 
 had gone wrong up the road, and I had to fly round 
 as fast s I could. I only got part of a cup o coffee 
 myself." 
 
 " Is she under your care ? " I asked. 
 
 The conductor moved the little girl to the seat 
 facing mine, and bent over to tell me. " She s left 
 all alone in the world. Father was a friend of mine, 
 freight conductor on the road, and he was killed 
 pretty near two years go. Wife was a nice little 
 woman, and the company helped her some, and she 
 sewed and got along very well for a while, but she 
 never had any health, and she died last Sunday of 
 the pneumonia very sudden, buried day before yes 
 terday. The folks in the house sent a dispatch to a 
 sister in Boston they d heard her speak of, and she 
 answered right off she d take the child. They can t 
 sell off what little stuff there is until they hear from 
 
A LITTLE TRAVELER. 249 
 
 her. My wife told me how things were and I spoke 
 to the superintendent and said I d take her on free, 
 I believed. I d a-taken her home myself and wel 
 come, but long J s she s got some folks of her own 
 she d better go to em. I don t much believe in 
 fetching up other folks children, but I told my wife 
 last thing as I came out of the house that if I did n t 
 like the looks of the woman that comes for her I m 
 just going to fetch her back again. She s the best 
 little thing I ever saw ; seems as if she knew what 
 had happened and was trying to make the best of it. 
 I found this Pullman was n t full, and I thought she 
 could move round in here more than in one of the 
 other cars. There ain t much travel at this time of 
 year." 
 
 " I 11 take the best care I can of her," said I ; 
 u I m going to Boston ; " and the conductor nodded 
 and touched Nelly s cheek and disappeared. 
 
 She seemed to look upon everybody as her friend. 
 She walked with unsteady, short steps to the other 
 end of the car, and the bride, who was a pleasant 
 looking young woman, spoke to her kindly and gave 
 her some candy ; but I was sure that presently the 
 child said, as she had said to me, that her mother 
 was dead, for I saw the girl bend over her and flush 
 a little, while her eyes filled with tears. I dare say 
 
250 A LITTLE TRAVELER. 
 
 she thought of her own mother whom she had so 
 lately left, and she put her arm close round the child 
 and kissed her, and afterwards seemed to be telling 
 her a story at which Nelly smiled now and then. 
 
 I read for a while, but in the middle of the after 
 noon I fell asleep, and when I waked again the car 
 lamps were lighted, and I looked for the little traveler, 
 who was standing in the passage way of the car. She 
 had taken off her hat and there was evidently some 
 thing wrong with it, for she was looking at it anx 
 iously and trying to fasten something which had 
 broken. I tried to beckon her to me, but in the seat 
 just beside her was the priest, a stout, unsympathetic 
 looking old gentleman, and I was half amused and 
 half touched to see her give the hat to him and show 
 him where to fasten the strap of it. He was evi 
 dently much confused ; he even blushed, but he did 
 what she asked him with clumsy fingers and then 
 put the hat on for her, as she stood before him and 
 bent down her head as if he would have had to reach 
 up to it. She was going away then, but he stopped 
 her and gave her some bits of money from his pocket; 
 she came a step or two nearer to him and held up 
 her face to kiss him, and then he looked out of the 
 window a minute and afterward turned and looked at 
 his neighbors appealingly. It had been like a flower 
 
A LITTLE TRAVELER. 251 
 
 dropped into his prosaic life, I imagine ; he was evi 
 dently quite surprised and pleased by so touching a 
 confidence. 
 
 It must have been a long, dull day for a child to 
 spend, but she was as good as possible, and did not 
 give anybody the least trouble. We talked with each 
 other about her, and felt as if she were under the care 
 of every one of us. I could not help thinking how 
 often we are at each other s mercy as we go through 
 this world, and how much better it would be if we 
 were as trustful and unsuspicious as this little child, 
 and only looked for kindness at our neighbors hands. 
 
 Just as it was growing dark she came to me and 
 put her hand into mine and gave it a little pull. 
 
 " Come and see the birds," said she, and I suddenly 
 became aware of the chirping of a robin somewhere 
 near us. It was a funny sound to hear in the winter 
 twilight, with the rattling of the train and shriek of 
 the whistles, for it was really the note of a robin who 
 was going to sleep on his nest in an apple-tree, or 
 high on an elm bough, some early summer evening. 
 But Nelly led me toward the old lady with so many 
 bundles, and I found one of her treasures was a bird 
 cage, and there sure enough was the red-breast, a fat 
 fellow with smooth feathers, who winked and blinked 
 at us and stopped his chirping as we stood beside 
 him. 
 
252 A LITTLE TRAVELER. 
 
 " She seems pleased with him, the little girl does," 
 said the bird s owner. " I d like to have her see the 
 rest of my birds. Twenty-three I ve got in all ; 
 thirteen of em s canaries. The woman in the other 
 part of the house is taking care of em while I m 
 gone. I m going on to Stockbridge to spend Thanks 
 giving with my niece. It was a great piece o work 
 to get started and I did n t feel at first s if I could 
 leave the birds, but I knew Martha s folks would feel 
 hurt if I put em off again this year about coming. 
 But I had to take the old robin alon^r with me. Some 
 
 o 
 
 folks said it might be the death of him, but he s 
 never been one mite scared. His cage stands in a 
 window at home where he sees a sight o passing. 
 He s the tamest thing you ever saw. Now I m so 
 fur on my way I m glad I did make up my mind to 
 start, though it 11 be bad getting there in the night. 
 I think a change is good for anybody, and then I m 
 so tied down most of the time with the birds that I 
 don t get out much, and there s nobody to fetch in 
 the news." 
 
 " Why don t you bring up a few carrier pigeons 
 with the rest of your family ? " said I, and this seemed 
 to amuse her very much. 
 
 " Sakes alive ! I don t want no more," said she ; 
 " but then I ve said that all along ; all the folks that 
 
A LITTLE TRAVELER. 253 
 
 keeps canaries in our place comes to me if anything 
 ails em. Then I take em to doctor and get so at- 
 
 o 
 
 tached to em I can t let em go again. I was telling 
 this little girl if I d known I was going to see her 
 I d have brought along a nice little linnet for her ; 
 he 11 sing all day long, but him and the one I put 
 him with is always fighting each other, and all my 
 other cages is too full a ready. I reckon you d be 
 good to the little bird, would n t you now, dear ? " 
 The little traveler smiled eagerly, while I suddenly 
 thought of the two sparrows that are sold for a far 
 thing of this world s money. 
 
 I think we were all anxious to see what kind of 
 woman the aunt would be, and I was half afraid she 
 would look hard-hearted, and I knew in that case I 
 should always be sorry when I thought of the little 
 girl whose hand I was so sorry to let go. I had 
 looked after her at night. I had waked a dozen times 
 to look at her sweet little shadowed face as she slept, 
 with the doll held fast in her arms. 
 
 At the station in the morning I found some one 
 waiting to meet me, but I could not go until I saw 
 the aunt. I waited with the conductor for a few min 
 utes, and I was beginning to fear I must say good-by 
 to my little traveler and never know her fortunes. 
 Every one of the passengers had given her some 
 thing, I believe picture-papers and fruit and candy 
 
254 A LITTLE TRAVELER. 
 
 and I do not know what else and I had seen even 
 the old priest kiss her good-by most tenderly, and lay 
 his hand on her head in what I am sure was a heart 
 felt blessing. I do not know whether it was some 
 grand old Latin benediction, or a simple longing that 
 God would be near to the lonely child and that His 
 saints would defend her as she goes through the 
 world. 
 
 I was glad when I saw just the woman I had 
 wished and hoped for coming hurriedly toward us 
 there was no doubt that it was all right, she was sure 
 of the child at a glance. I had fancied all the time 
 that she must look like her mother. 
 
 " My dear baby ! " the woman said with a sob, and 
 caught her in her arms, while the little girl, with a 
 quick, instinctive love, put out her short arms and 
 they clung to each other without a word. 
 
 It was all right, as the conductor said again, half to 
 himself and half to me. After a minute the woman 
 said brokenly that she thanked him for his kindness. 
 Poor Ellen ! she never knew she was sick till the 
 news came she was gone. He must tell the people 
 out there that Nelly would have a good home. They 
 stopped to talk longer and Nelly stood gravely by, 
 but I had to hurry away, and after I was in the car 
 riage I wished I could go back to kiss the little thing 
 again. 
 
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