{"1": {"fulltext": "mg\\n:vs,\\\\-\\n\u00e2\u0096\u00a0^v\\\\-K\\\\\\\\\\\\-sS^\\\\V\\ni^-A^\\niil!^-\\n.X", "height": "3310", "width": "2227", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0001.jp2"}, "2": {"fulltext": "\u00c2\u00abi,VBi,aa tei.i-Sfcts\\nLIBRARY OF CONGRESS,\\nsfiiiit.K.r G0ipriB]^i:f\u00c2\u00bb\\nShelf K 7 5:\\nUNITED STATES OF AMERICA.", "height": "3228", "width": "2110", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0002.jp2"}, "3": {"fulltext": "", "height": "3182", "width": "2110", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0003.jp2"}, "4": {"fulltext": "", "height": "3234", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0004.jp2"}, "5": {"fulltext": "", "height": "3216", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0005.jp2"}, "6": {"fulltext": "", "height": "3234", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0006.jp2"}, "7": {"fulltext": "NEW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nBY\\nE. H, ARR.\\n(cOZSJ\\nPHILADELPHIA:\\nJ. B. LIPPINCOTT CO.\\n1880.", "height": "3216", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0007.jp2"}, "8": {"fulltext": "if\\nCopyright, 1880, by J. B. LinuNCOTT Co.", "height": "3234", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0008.jp2"}, "9": {"fulltext": "TO THE MEMORY\\nOF\\nMY ELDEST DAUGHTER, MARION,\\nWHO DEARLY LOVED NATURE,\\nAND TO\\nMY SON PHILIP,\\nWHO WILL, I TRUST, IN THIS RESPECT RESEMBLE HER,\\nTHIS LITTLE BOOK\\nIS TENDERLY DEDICATED.", "height": "3216", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0009.jp2"}, "10": {"fulltext": "", "height": "3234", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0010.jp2"}, "11": {"fulltext": "PREFACE.\\nThis little book is published with no thought\\nof an audience. It tells of real scenes, and\\nof people who w^ere actors in them but the\\nlife it deals with is so very simple that it can\\nhardly satisfy the exacting appetite of the\\nreading public.\\nIt is permitted to go into print, especially\\nfor three children, with hope that their curi-\\nosity and aifections may be stimulated by it\\ntowards those ancestors from whom they have\\ngotten much of the good which is in them,\\nand that from it they may turn with desire\\nand appreciation to sources of what have been\\nto me abundant and enduring riches.\\nVery delightful have been these reminis-\\ncences, taking me back to bygone days and\\nmuch good company reframing delicious pic-\\n5", "height": "3216", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0011.jp2"}, "12": {"fulltext": "6 PREFACE.\\ntures which have kept their color through\\nforty years.\\nThe children will read the book, because\\nthey will be partial. Some old-time country\\nlivers, caught by its title, may run over its\\npages, recognize familiar things, and be quick-\\nened by them into pleasant memories.\\nAll the more flattering will be this increase\\nof readers, because I shall know that the\\nhearts of such have been enriched by their\\nsweet experiences of rural life.\\nE. H. A.", "height": "3234", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0012.jp2"}, "13": {"fulltext": "CONTENTS.\\nCHAPTEU\\nI. Etchings\\nPAGE\\n9\\nII. The Farm\\n23\\nIII.\u00e2\u0080\u0094 The Farm-House\\n36\\nIV.\u00e2\u0080\u0094 SPRINa-TlME AND HAYING\\n54\\nV. The Visit\\n73\\nVI. Little Benny\\n89\\nVII.\u00e2\u0080\u0094 The Burial-Place\\n98\\nVIII. Hannah and Jonathan\\nIll\\nIX. The Weekly Koutine\\n125\\nX. Neighbors\\n132\\nXI.\u00e2\u0080\u0094 Sunday\\n146\\nXII. Old Trees\\n159\\nXIII.\u00e2\u0080\u0094 The District School\\n174\\nXIV. After the Summer\\n190\\nXV. Winter Pleasures\\n200", "height": "3216", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0013.jp2"}, "14": {"fulltext": "", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0014.jp2"}, "15": {"fulltext": "NEW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nCHAPTER I.\\nETCHINGS.\\nIn ;N orthern New England, in the tradi-\\ntional good old times, to own a house was\\na condition of thrifty citizenship. For this a\\nyoung couple would toil early and late w^ith\\nheroic self-denial. No matter how humhle\\nthis home was, it must he one s own. When\\na man married, he at once set up a household,\\nand, as he needed, he let out his four walls,\\nand seamed and patched them. His barns ran\\nover, and he added to them. He planted an\\norchard, and set out poplars before his door.\\nThe roughness of toil was ground into his\\nbones and muscles. He grew hard-featured\\nand hard-fisted, while his w^ife grew jaded and\\nangular. Their children became like them.\\nThey were all weather-changed into a kind of\\npeculiar peasantry, a readily recognized prod-\\n2 9", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0015.jp2"}, "16": {"fulltext": "10 NEW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nuct of their condition, tlie busy, lionest, per-\\nsistent, hopeful, helpful New England farmer s\\nfamily. The visible signs of their labors were\\nhardly more than an orchard of straggling\\ntrees; the annual rotation of crops; and the\\ndaily spilling out from the doors of family-\\nlife. It was a most simple living, easily\\ndescribed with few words; but the core of\\nprogressive culture, the nursery of strong\\ncharacter.\\nTheir houses and their surroundings were\\nsuch as might be expected. The apple-trees,\\nwhich they set out, bore crabbed fruit, and\\nwere of little value but, as a feature of farm-\\nlife, they served their purpose. There were\\nalways good apples enough for home use.\\nThe names of some of them, given by acci-\\ndent, became household words; and, when\\nthey had lived their life out, the excellence of\\ntheir fruits passed into tradition. I could walk\\nto-day to the very spot where stood Farmer\\nM. s Long-nose and Pudding-sweet, two\\nragged, stalwart trees, famous in the district.\\nThe mildly-sour Long-nose tasted best when\\njust picked from the greensward, and the\\nmealy Pudding-sweet when sucked by the\\neater while sitting upon a low-lying branch\\nof the tree which bore it.\\nAn old orchard is a friendly place. Wher-", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0016.jp2"}, "17": {"fulltext": "ETCHINGS, 11\\never you stumble upon one tlie spirit of home-\\nlikeness and past occupation are with it. If\\nthere are no house-walls to be seen, you are\\nsure to find near by the rubbish of them, by\\nwhich you know that once the simple processes\\nof farm-life went daily on under its trees. The\\njagged, sprouting old stumps are the record\\nof it.\\nOn the whole, what farm appendage was\\nbetter in possession, is better in memory, than\\nits riotous old orchard? It was, in spring, a\\nrose-2:arden, which scented the air with attar,\\nand filled the landscape with a transient glory.\\nIn summer, standing in the foreground of its\\novertopping verdure, the houses let out into it\\nthe homeliness of their vocations. Then into\\nthe postures and implements of housewives,\\nand the work they did, passed the glamour of\\nits growth and its sunshine. In it, and by\\nit, people and things, otherwise unattractive,\\nbecame beautiful incidents and accidents of\\nit. You have not forgotten the bare-armed\\nwomen, spreading their linen to bleach; pans\\nscalding in the sunshine the bee-hives the\\ngrindstone; the mowers whetting their scythes,\\nand other loose-lying debris of farm-work; the\\npicturesque absorption of the orchard s sum-\\nmer-life. You hold fast in memory some\\ntree, or trees, the ripening and gradual gath-", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0017.jp2"}, "18": {"fulltext": "12 NEW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nering of whose fruits were happy features of\\nyour childhood.\\nThe orchard almost always started from the\\nback-door of a farm-house, where burdocks\\nand other rank-smelling weeds grew and waste\\nwaters trickled out; but it stretched into a\\nverdure, the sweetness and cleanliness and ten-\\nderness of which could only be found under\\nits trees. Here night-dews lingered, and\\napples mellowed toothsomely, under the mat-\\nted grass. Here was the couch of the tired\\nlaborer and the play-ground of children, wdio\\nwore ruts in its sod, and half lived in summer\\nupon its forage.\\nThe Lombardy poplars, which were planted\\nin front of these earlier farm-houses, were stiff,\\ncompact, erect trees, always aggressive upon\\nthe landscape. They were fast-growing, but\\nof short-lived vigor, and died by early though\\nslow decay. They were perhaps the natural\\noutcrop of a generation which began and ended\\nwith shoulder to the plough, and hand to the\\ndistaff; whose chief literature was the Bible\\nwhose law was truth, and whose highest recre-\\nation was the rest of the Sabbath. You still\\nsee, here and there, these aged poplars scat-\\ntered through ISTew England. They are ghosts\\nof trees, half dead, often isolated yet, should\\nsearch be made, sure to be found standing", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0018.jp2"}, "19": {"fulltext": "ETCHINGS. 13\\nsteadfast by the site of an ancient homestead.\\nOften they linger in front of a square, flat-\\nroofed old house, given over, like themselves,\\nto decay both come down from a long dead\\ngeneration. They have a way of lifting them-\\nselves up and standing out from a landscape.\\nOne sees them from afar, like index-fingers,\\npointing backwards, not without pathos, to the\\npast.\\nIf the farmers who planted these trees\\nseemed hard and stern, it was owing largely\\nto their resolute fidelity to the necessities of\\ntheir vocation. They were pioneers the hew-\\ners out of a path to a broader culture. They\\nwere not unlike their own hills, which, though\\nrugged and steep, were, at the same time, the\\nglory of the landscape. They loved the homes\\nto which they had given the richness and\\nstrength of their days. That power of asso-\\nciation which comes from dwelling long in a\\nspot, and which clings eternally to it, took\\ndeep root in them. At the same time, there\\nwent out from them, into their walls and fur-\\nnishings, that sweetness of life-expression given\\nto them by long use. Time mellowed their\\nhomes; scars enriched them necessity added\\nto them, until, from very bare beginnings,\\ngrew the quaintly furnished, picturesque, sim-\\npl}^ beautiful old farm-houses.", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0019.jp2"}, "20": {"fulltext": "14 NEW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nVery miicli of the thrift and honesty pe-\\nculiar to the ITew England race has flowed\\nthrough tins primitive and sturdy stock.\\nLooking hack, I see men and women whose\\ncharacters were of the best the lines of which,\\nlike etchings, are sharp and suggestive.\\nThe last time I ever saw old Farmer M. he\\nwas firmly grasping a pitchfork, which was\\nplanted in his load; and, from his cart, was\\ngiving directions to half a score of stalwart\\nlaborers. His hat was weather-beaten; his\\ngarments were coarse and ill-fitting. To one\\nunused to country life, he would have seemed\\na rough old man, a common farmer; the\\nworn-out owner of a few acres and a little\\nmoney, gotten by working while others slept\\nby self-denial when indulgence would have\\nseemed a virtue one who doubled the toils of\\nsummer, and cheated himself out of the rest of\\nwinter, a sort of barren waif, almost cast out\\nfrom one century upon the shore of another.\\nAltogether otherwise this man seemed to\\nme. I had known him from my earliest\\nchildhood. He had done faithfully the work\\nwhich had been given him to do. Whatever\\nlay within its scope and possibilities he had\\naccomplished. Whatever of dignity could be\\ngiven, by truth and industry and self-respect,\\nto a farmer s life, had been given to his. Forty", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0020.jp2"}, "21": {"fulltext": "ETCHINGS. 15\\nyears before he had been a rustic king in his\\nfields. He was a king still, this old man of\\neighty-odd years. There was the same stamp\\nof force upon him. He was old age wiser\\nthan youth decay more potent than growth\\nweakness dictating to strength. Time had\\nploughed over him but, if his hand had\\nlost its cunning, his eye had not lost its fire.\\nIf his body was wellnigh spent, his intellect\\nwas unabated. As he stood, poised upon the\\nfruits of his harvest, ruling, with positive will\\nand clear judgment, his laborers of a later\\ngeneration, he seemed like the old hero that\\nhe was a half-defiant conqueror over circum-\\nstance, brave and resistant to the last. It was\\ngrand to see him, this half-wild son of nature,\\nstanding clear-cut against the blue sky, held\\nup by the instruments and adjuncts of a life\\nof toil the wrinkled, aged harvester, tossed\\nout at his last, with a sort of fierce gesture,\\ninto this transient, but suggestive, picture.\\nClad in homespun, roughened by toil, with no\\nacquired graces of speech, there was yet about\\nhim a certain expression of inborn dignity\\nwhich compelled respect. His eye was pierc-\\ning his voice incisive his words few his\\nmanner forcible. He was an eager, honest,\\nsuccessful man, who had taken and held life\\nby siege and storm.", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0021.jp2"}, "22": {"fulltext": "16 ^^EW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nThis farmer s story will be read hereafter in\\ncharacter; not in books. It would be tame\\nwritten out, the daily life of this man, who,\\nthrough all his working years, tilled the soil\\nin summer and split rocks in winter. But\\nby and by some famous man will have inher-\\nited good blood from this farmer, who, in his\\nplain village life, was known for his upright-\\nness, his thrift, his intelligence, and his sagac-\\nity. He will be proud of this ancestor, v diom\\nthe bad feared and the good honored of this\\nman, whose nobility of nature gave breadth to\\nthe narrowness of his calling. Some woman,\\nwith more than ordinary beauty, may owe it\\nto this old man, whose sinews, given early to\\nthe tuition of nature, grew into symmetrical\\nstature and whose fresh young features w^ere\\nhardened, by care and exposure, into an ex-\\npression of honest and heroic audacity.\\nS., the blacksmith, who shod horses by day\\nand after nightfall reasoned Avith his neighbors\\nin the village store, was a remarkable man.\\nHe was well-read was especially strong in\\nhistory, and an excellent debater. His eyes\\nwere always bloodshot, and his face was as\\nhard lined as the steel bars upon which he\\nwrought; yet, on Sundays, washed clean from\\nthe smut of toil, it was a face worthy to be\\nremembered. Then he was a noble-lookiug", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0022.jp2"}, "23": {"fulltext": "ETCHINGS. 17\\nman, sitting, broad-browed, erect, and observ-\\nant, at the head of his pew, where he fol-\\nlowed Parson B. s long and sensible discourses\\nwith the keen relish of an apt logician. This\\nblacksmith shod horses admirably. His shoes\\nfitted, and his nails never missed. In his\\nchosen vocation he had a perfect career, be-\\ncause whatever he did he did well. People\\ncame to him from far and near, for no known\\nblacksmith shod horses so well as he. In this\\nmerit of his work lay the pathos of his life for\\nthis man, who shod horses, might have ruled\\nmen. The logic which swayed the loungers\\nin the village store should have been given to\\nhis equals. It is a mystery why this stalwart\\nwrangler, who might have figured and grown\\nfamous in the world, hammered away, all his\\nda^^s, at horses feet in a village smithy.\\nThere is no end to these remembered rep-\\nresentative characters quaint and positive,\\nalways grand, because underlaid by simplicity\\nand fidelity to right.\\nThese farmers did not adorn their houses\\nmuch, either in-doors or out, for they were\\nalmost always work-driven and weary. I*^a-\\nture took up their task where they left it.\\nThey planted fences and gates and w^ell-\\nsweeps. She, with her frosts and stains and\\nmosses, tumbled and embellished them. The", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0023.jp2"}, "24": {"fulltext": "18 NEW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nsaplings tliey started grew into prim poplars\\nand dense, ill-bearing orchards; but there was\\nabout these half-worthless trees, in their moss-\\nclad old age, a kind of fitness which served its\\ntime and purpose. When the square, brown\\nfarm-houses began to decay, and farmers to\\ngraft their newly-planted stocks, the poplars\\nand shaggy old apple-trees began also to die.\\nEach was a sort of appendage to the other,\\nand so they passed away together.\\nThe sweetest and most natural outgrowth\\nof old-time pastoral life was a love of, and\\nclinging to, the old homesteads. Once New\\nEngland w^as full of them; great, brown, roomy,\\nhomely houses, facing the south led to by\\ngreen lanes; shut in by ancestral fields stand-\\ning quite even with the greensward, which\\nthey met with low-lying stones dug out from\\ntheir own pastures. Each had its fiimily\\nburial-place, blessed spot. They were all rich\\nin springs and brooks and woodlands. They\\nhad added to them, year after year, the glory\\nof trees and bushes and vines; the wild growth\\nof seeds, flung by the winds into the crevices\\nof walls and unused places. That which was\\npeculiar to them, that which could not be\\nsimulated by art, w^as a certain beauty given\\nto them by time and use and decay, a sort of\\nmellowing into the landscape of the piles and", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0024.jp2"}, "25": {"fulltext": "ETCHINGS. 19\\ntheir adjuncts, by which each homestead took\\nunto itself an individual expression for its owner\\nand his descendants. The aspect of a farm-\\nhouse was, to the children of it, as personal\\nof recognition as the face of a father or grand-\\nfather. It was to be held in the family name,\\nand go down with it. It was the sanctuary\\nof homely virtues the centre of family re-\\nunions the place of its yearly thanksgiving\\na spot from w^hich its membership had en-\\nlarged and diverged; and to which, when they\\ndied, its sons and daughters were brought\\nback for burial. In it, generation after gen-\\neration, there was always one left. It was\\neither a faithful son or daughter who had\\nmarried one of her own sort. These men\\nand women were spoken of as the boys\\nand girls at home, and, as such, they were\\nmost admirable. Eo matter how little fitted\\nthey seemed to be for any other sphere, as\\nthe appendages and rulers of these old houses\\nthey could have hardly been changed for the\\nbetter. They were a portion of their appro-\\npriate machinery, and stayed by them from\\nchoice, because their lives had not grown\\naway from them. The men had a certain\\naudacity of mien the simple abandon of per-\\nsons whose dealings were largely with nature.\\nThe women had no artificial ways; little", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0025.jp2"}, "26": {"fulltext": "20 ^EW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nlearning; but much good sense, and their\\ngreatest charm was that they were easily satis-\\nfied with small pleasures. Their children were\\nthe country cousins as much a sweet fea-\\nture of farm-life as were its dandelions and\\nbuttercups and daisies.\\nThus, by rotation, the homestead was always\\nfilled. The foreign land, to which its in-\\ndwellers all travelled, was the little burial-\\nground close by. The journey to this was\\nshort by linear measurement; but, reckoned\\nby the events and worth of the days and\\nmonths and years it took to get there, it Avas\\na travel wonderfully rich in effort and results.\\nThe external signs of this journey were the\\nruts in the boards and stones, worn by the\\nsteady tramp of feet. What you could not\\nsee was the life which had been constantly\\ndiverging from such fountains of piety, truth,\\nand industry.\\nAs I look back, what strikes me most in\\nthat old country living is its simplicity, its\\nearnestness, its honesty, and its dignity. The\\nmen and women seemed to grapple wdth their\\ninherited burdens. They were a race of born\\nathletes and wrestlers with the soil the natu-\\nral outgrowth of it.\\nI see them walking, as they used, across\\nthe green fields to the meeting-house, which", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0026.jp2"}, "27": {"fulltext": "ETCHINGS. 21\\nstood on a liill a mile away from my grand-\\nfather s, clad in their long-kept, variously-\\nmade holiday garments, a quaint procession.\\nThere are samples of shawls and dresses,\\npreserved by me in memory from the attire\\nof my grandfather s fellow-worshippers, every\\nthread of whose real texture has been eaten\\naway. I know just how they were worn.\\nOld Dame H. had a soft, silky, crimson shawl,\\nwhich she drew closely over her shoulders, and\\npinned three times down in front. The pins\\nseemed never to vary a thread; and year after\\nyear her sharp shoulders rubbed at its warp\\nand woof until it grew stringy and streaked.\\nThere were coats and cloaks and dresses, so\\nfar removed from any suggestion of mode\\nthat their strangeness of make, joined with\\nrichness of fabric, gave dignity to them, and\\nthe men and women who wore them were the\\nauthors of a true style.\\nOld Squire S. never put aside his plaid cloak\\nlined with green baize. His sons and daughters\\nwent away from the homestead, and came back\\nrichly clad in the world s fashions. That made\\nno difference to him. He walked up the church\\naisle, year after year, in front of the gayest of\\nthem, with his old plaid, which wrapped him\\nabout like a tartan and, through the singing\\nof psalms, prayers, and benedictions, he stood,", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0027.jp2"}, "28": {"fulltext": "22 ^EW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nwith tlie green baize flung over his shoulders,\\nunconscious that there was anything queer or\\npld-fashioned about him. There was nothing\\nold-fashioned. He was a splendid old man,\\nerect, proud, with a broad, white brow, and a\\ngrand record for brain-work in all the courts.\\nThe old cloak had become a kind of toga, in-\\nvested by him with the worth of long associa-\\ntion, and so had grown to be invaluably a part\\nof himself.\\nThere is a sentiment about old wraps, which\\nhave travelled with you, and stood by you when\\nthe flimsiness of other attire has failed. It\\nneeds not to be woven in with camel s hair, and\\nit does not suit the texture of lace. It is hos-\\ntile to fashion, and comes only with using. It is\\ntender, and touches you like keepsakes of lost\\nfriends. Your best imported wraps are those\\nwhich you have brought across the sea your-\\nself; which have the imprint of travel and good\\ncompanionship which have been tossed about\\nin many lands, and had their colors mellowed\\nby much usage. Such can never be duplicated\\nnor simulated. They are a true tapestry, in-\\nwrought with a part of the richness of your life.\\nWliy cannot some web be woven fit for life-\\nlong wear, so that memory may be allowed to\\ncrystallize about it, and then the mantles of\\nthose we have loved could literally fall upon us", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0028.jp2"}, "29": {"fulltext": "CHAPTER 11.\\nTHE FARM.\\nMy grandfather built his house in the\\nmiddle of his farm. All the farm-houses in\\nthat neighborhood were thus centrally located.\\nIsolation Avas the result so was also economy\\nof working force, no mean item where the\\nsoil was hard, rocky, and ungrateful, and\\nbread was truly to be won by sweat of the\\nbrow. Distance lent much beauty to these\\nplain farm-houses. The long, tree-arched\\ngreen lanes leading to them, their cumbrous\\ngates, their straggling sheds, and half-slovenly\\nprofusion of wood-piles and carts, went into\\nthe picture and the softening aspect of smoke\\nand cloud and outlying verdure gave to them\\nthe baptismal touch of all-creative nature.\\nMy grandfather s lane was overhung by\\nstalwart elms and maples. Just at its en-\\ntrance was a bubbling spring, whose waters\\ntrickled down by ^the way-side through beds\\nof violets and wild flag. The lane itself was\\nfenced in by a stone wall; in my day tum-\\nbled by frost and fretted with moss. Its turf\\n23", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0029.jp2"}, "30": {"fulltext": "24 J^^EW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nwas like velvet. Two deep wheel-ruts, the\\nwear of years, ran through it, in and out of\\nwhich the family chaise bounced rollickingly,\\nfor horses were sure to prick up their ears\\nand quicken their pace as soon as they snuffed\\nthe cool spring. You know that pleasant\\nsound, when, upon turning from the hard\\nhighway, their hoofs struck the porous soil.\\nAt the lane s farther end was a gate with a\\nhuge, upright beam, uncouth, clumsy, and\\nslow to move on its hinges, apt to sag,\\nploughing a semicircle with its nigh end, and\\nweighing heavily upon the shoulder of the\\nopener. Endurance seemed to have entered\\ninto all the building plans of old-time workers;\\nand size and weight were to them the emblems\\nof endurance. About ni}^ grandfather s gate\\nsmart-weed and dock-weed and plantain grew\\nprofusely, mean weeds; but Hannah, maid-\\nof-all-work, distilled from them dyes and\\nbalsams. Beauty lay hidden in their juices,\\nwhich Hannah expressed and fastened into\\nher patiently spun and woven fabrics of\\ncotton, linen, and woollen. Over the gate\\nand over the well a massive butternut-tree\\nilung its branches. It stands to-day, with its\\ntrunk half rotten, and I sit under it and seem\\nagain a child. Only for a moment, for, with\\nthe years that have gone into my life, some-", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0030.jp2"}, "31": {"fulltext": "THE FARM. 25\\ntiling sweet and beautiful has gone out of it.\\nDear little Benny you and I came first to-\\ngether through the gateway into the farm-\\nhouse yard. A white-haired old man stood\\nin the door to welcome us. It was late on a\\nsummer s day so late that the cattle were\\nlowing to be let through the pasture-bars;\\nthe work of the day was w^ellnigh past, and\\nthe dews and peace of night were beginning\\nto fall. Sweet, sacred eventide Gone are\\nthey all, the dear old man, the beautiful\\nboy, the herds, and the laborers who wrought\\nwith them. The structures, built by mortal\\nhands, are rotting and tumbling; the tree is\\ndying; the rest are shadowy things of mem-\\nory. I look down into the deep old well,\\nwith its unsafe curb and sweep (how foolish\\nI am for the trout little Benny dropped there\\nmore than forty years ago. I see nothing save\\ngreen, slimy rocks and the shadow of my own\\nface.\\nI say little Benny, because dead children\\nnever grow old. We talk of what they might\\nhave been, but we possess only what they were.\\nLittle Benny died more than forty years ago,\\na beautiful, precocious boy. Had he lived, he\\nmight have been a famous man. He is only\\nremembered as the loving, lovable child, and\\nas such I go back to meet him. Very few are", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0031.jp2"}, "32": {"fulltext": "26 ^EW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nthe lasting impressions of the forms and fea-\\ntures of lost ones. Some intensity of word or\\nlook or action glorifies a moment of a child s\\nlife, and makes its expression an imperishable\\nthing of memory.\\nMarion, brown-eyed Marion, rosy, radiant,\\nflinging back her hair with careless abandon,\\nbursts into my room. By that one attitude\\nand expression I best remember her. You\\ncan never know what unwitting posture of\\nyour child is to become a treasure to you. If\\nit dies, you will lose hold of its heart-rending\\nreality, and will be consoled by the ideal sug-\\ngestiveness of its occasional aspects. This is\\nthe healing which time, and time alone, brings\\nto your sorrows.\\nThus talks the old well to me, treading cau-\\ntiously upon its rickety platform. High up\\ndangles the rusty bucket-handle the balance\\nweight is gone the sweep and beam are rotten\\nand ready to fall. A spasm of tenderness\\nseizes me; things take life. Summer days\\ncome back to me, and with them beautiful\\nrural pictures of tired men and patient animals\\nslaking their thirst. I shut my eyes and the\\n3^ard is alive again. Oxen are lapping cool\\nwater from the trough laborers are grasping\\nthe dripping bucket, poised on the edge of the\\ncurb upon the doorstep sits my grandfather,", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0032.jp2"}, "33": {"fulltext": "THE FARM. 27\\nhis white hair streaming over his shoulders.\\nHow clear-cut the whole scene is, this picture\\nof common farm-life The oxen lift their\\nheads and hlink their eyes, and then go back\\nto their draught. It seems as if they never\\nwould be done. The men let down the bucket\\ntwice and thrice over, and up it comes, each\\ntime more coolly dripping than before. Its\\ncrystal streams splash back into the deep old\\nwell with a pleasant, resonant sound. Hannah\\ncomes out with her pails and fills them, and I,\\nstanding on tiptoe, lean over the curb and\\nwatch the water as it trickles down the mossy\\nrocks. She is meanwhile unconscious, as I am,\\nthat through those simple acts our lives are\\nbeing irrevocably woven together, each with\\nthe other, as well as with the drinkers and\\ndrawers around us, in a never-fading picture.\\nDear, cool, overflowing, delightful old well\\nyour waters in those summer days were magic\\nwaters, and the creatures who drank of you,\\neven the dumbest of them, were by you bap-\\ntized for me with an undying beauty.\\nThe heavy farm-gates, though uncouth and\\nhard to manage, were made pleasant objects\\nby age. The lane-gate of my grandfather,\\nhugged by a vine, had put out grasses and\\nweeds from its joints, and was mottled all\\nover with moss. The make of these gates", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0033.jp2"}, "34": {"fulltext": "28 NEW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nwas always a marvel. Pegs and supple withes\\nstood instead of hinges and a strong bar,\\nfastened to their centre, ran, with a sharp\\nangle, to the upper end of a tall post. They\\nwere in keeping with the well-sweeps, the\\nragged fences, and stone Avails. They grew,\\npicturesquely, into the landscape, and pointed\\nout otherwise inconspicuous entrance-ways.\\nThese latter were often only slight wheel-ruts\\ncut into the sods of the fields, so that the gate-\\nposts served as signboards to benighted and\\nweary travellers. They loomed up, gray and\\nghostly, out of the darkness of night, and were\\nhomely signals of hospitality in winter snow-\\nwastes. I see the gate, we re almost there\\nshouted Benny. We were making our first\\njoint visit to my grandfather s farm, and the\\nfriendly bars and beams of this gate beckoned\\nto us. Hospitable old gate which would\\nnever then budge an inch at my tugging but\\nwhich nevertheless always swung, with a right\\nroyal arch, wide open, to let me in.\\nA second gate, at my grandfather s, opened\\nfrom the opposite side of the farm-house yard,\\njust beyond the butternut-tree, into another\\nlane. This lane went down into the pasture\\nand the woodland. At its farther end were\\nthe clumsy, unstable pasture-bars, against\\nwhich the cattle crowded at nightfall, and", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0034.jp2"}, "35": {"fulltext": "THE FARM. 29\\nleaped past the fearless cliildren wlio let tliem\\nout. These farmers children, who roamed\\npastures and woods, unmindful of herds, and\\ncame back shaggy and weighed down with all\\nsorts of wild growth, were truly the foster-\\nchildren of nature. Year after year of their\\nhalf-untamed lives she o:ave to them the sim-\\npie gifts of her annual harvests, and quick-\\nened their senses towards that in her which\\nwas imperishable. These young freebooters\\nlaid up enduring riches. Lying on her pas-\\nture-knolls, tossing about amongst her dead\\nleaves, tramping through brooks and bogs\\nand brushwood, they stumbled upon her\\ntreasures unawares. The berries and nuts\\nand mints they sought were transient things\\nbut the glories of the days which brought\\nthem entered into, and gave to them a good\\nand delight which were eternal. Those chil-\\ndren are made richer and better, who have\\nearly dealings with I^ature she gives to them\\na joy which will stand by them all their days.\\nIf they get it not, they will have missed some-\\nthing most admirable out of their lives.\\nIn farmers families, the driving of the cows\\nto pasture passed by rotation from one child to\\nanother. Sometimes a man or woman of the\\nhousehold took up the task, from necessity or\\ninclination, as a duty or diversion. They", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0035.jp2"}, "36": {"fulltext": "30 ^EW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nwere, most often, thoughtful, observant men\\nand women, to whom their mornmg and even-\\ning lessons, such as God gave to them in the\\nchangeful aspects of earth and sky, were, per-\\nhaps half unconsciously, well learned. Sweet\\nscents and sounds and sights greeted them.\\nThey got from the morning strength for the\\nday s burdens, and the peace of twilight lifted\\nthese burdens from them. I recall three men\\nwho, all through middle life and far into old\\nage, morning and night, at unvarying hours,\\ndrove their herds to and from the pastures.\\nTheir cows knew them, and, in the virtue of\\npatience, seemed quite as human as they. The;)^\\nwere all three grand men, sensible, honest, and\\ncarrying weight in town affiiirs. This humble\\nduty, cheerfully done, did but illustrate and\\nembellish the childlike simplicity of their lives.\\nThere could be no more pastoral picture than\\nthat of these respectable farmers plodding along\\nthe highway with their cows in the early bright-\\nness of morning. They were literally walking\\nhand in hand with nature. Transplanted into\\na city, they would have been poor in its riches,\\nunfitted for its pursuits and pastimes. On\\nthe country highway they were heirs of the\\nsoil lessees of the landscapes and sky views\\nunconscious absorbents of the earth s bright-\\nness and beauty. I know men in high places", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0036.jp2"}, "37": {"fulltext": "THE FARM. 31\\nwho look back with keen pleasure to their\\ncow-driving days, when the lowing herds used\\nto come across the rocky pastures to meet\\nthem, and who, from these enforced morning\\nand evening walks, grew to be observers and\\nlovers of nature. I remember with delight\\nmy grandfather s pasture, poor of soil and\\nscanty of herbage uneven of surface its\\nhillocks clad with moss and wintergreen cut\\nin two by a clear, babbling brook; shaded\\nhere and there by clumps of trees; ragged\\nwith rocks and ferns and wild shrubs marshy\\nnext to the mill-pond, as well as treacherous,\\nand tangled with flag and bulrushes. Kare\\nold Rew England pasture-lands You were\\nstingy of grass, but you were never-failing in\\nbeauty, that beauty which was revealed to\\nthe children, who, next to the herds, were\\nyour true owners. Early in spring-time,\\nagainst lingering snow-banks, came beds of\\nblue and white violets; a little later, hidden\\namong crisp, crackling leaves, pink and\\nwhite arbutus, sweetest of all spring blos-\\nsoms. Ferns unfolded; mint scented the\\nbrookside coltsfoot brightened its shoal bed\\nthe marsh bristled with spiked leaves. With\\nthe coming of summer, the water-soaked and\\nporous soil by degrees dried up. One had\\nno longer to pick his way from stone to", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0037.jp2"}, "38": {"fulltext": "32 J^EW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nstone across boggy places (what early pasture\\nroamer does not recall the overrated audacity\\nof such passages ferns grew strong and deep-\\ncolored bog onions curled their brown coils\\nagainst the rocks (they would not pull now\\nwith the old relish) weeds and shrubs and\\nstinted trees took on the gifts of the passing\\nseasons, and, as you trod on them or brushed\\nby them, sent out to you their wild flavors.\\nClose by the mill-pond the soil was always\\nsoft, and marked by the hoof-prints of cattle.\\nHere the pond was shoal and full of lilies.\\nOn hot summer days the tired animals would\\nstand for hours knee-deep in the sluggish\\nwater, unconscious pictures of peaceful pas-\\ntoral life. Their crooked trail, winding in\\nand out through the dampest and shadiest\\nportion of the pasture-land, had a friendly\\nlook. Its black line was easy to be traced far\\ninto the evening, and was always a pleasant\\nthing to stumble upon. It has guided many a\\nwanderer home. What traveller has not had\\nhis heart gladdened by footprints in waste\\nplaces My path was treacherous and hard to\\nfollow, but it led one down through tall, sweet-\\nscented bushes; across the shoal brook; over a\\nlong stretch of ferns past rocks and crackling\\nbrushwood, into the alders and bulrushes and\\nwild flag, outside of which were the shoal", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0038.jp2"}, "39": {"fulltext": "THE FARM. 33\\nwater and a lily-bed, where, stuck fast in the\\nmud, was a rotting old boat, which the waves\\nlapped lazily.\\nHere the children from far and near used to\\ncome for lilies, pushing with poles out into the\\npond. One summer day, at nightfall, a little\\ngirl was missing from a farmer s house. She\\nhad gone out in the morning and had not come\\nback. Two weeks went by and no clue of her\\nwas found. Meanwhile the budded lilies blos-\\nsomed on the pond, and other children went\\none day in search of them. They came back,\\nnot lily-laden, but with a great horror on their\\nlips. Pushing about among the pads, they\\nhad come upon something which they dared\\nnot touch; something which two weeks be-\\nfore was fairer than any lily, but which now\\nwas an awful thing, to be hastily put out of\\nsight.\\nOn this shore the children used to plait rush\\ncaps and play with flag-leaves in mimic war-\\nfare. The black, soggy soil was honeycombed\\nby their busy feet, and their constant com-\\npanions were the cattle, who cooled themselves\\nin the shoal edge of the pond. The blue of\\nthe distant hills, the sunshine, the shimmer of\\nthe pond, the verdure of forest and wood-\\nland and lowland and upland overarched and\\nsurrounded and hemmed them in. Absorbed", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0039.jp2"}, "40": {"fulltext": "34 ^EW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nthus by the landscape, they were made transient\\nfeatures of its glory.\\nWhen the summer had passed, grasses\\nbloomed, with a faint purple haze, on the up-\\nlands, and bushes flaunted in crimson, fore-\\nrunners of the dying of the year. Rare pas-\\ntoral scenes Again I am watching the shadows\\nof ancient pines, lying across the pond herds\\nbrowse the hillocks I see the daintily coiling\\nsmoke of distant farm-houses the coquetting\\nof clouds and sunshine the noble framework\\nof hill and forest. The old music comes back,\\nthe ring of the woodman s axe the whiz of\\nthe mill under the hill the lowing of herds\\nbird-song; insect-hum; and, above all, the\\ndrowsy lapping of the pond against its shore.\\nBehold the beauty, the plenty, the generosity\\nof my pasture\\nWhat shall be said of the woodland, grand,\\nsolemn old woodland, with its pines, grim, and\\nragged with time full of pallid ferns and\\nsuch dainty blossoms as love dark places;\\ntangled with a wild undergrowth, and ankle-\\ndeep with the crackling waste of past years\\nDense, damp, dark, stately old woodland, I\\nlove all pines because of my early friendship\\nwith yours. Lying on the mouldy carpet of\\nyour waste verdure, I caught your whispers\\nwith the hidden sources of your growth, and", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0040.jp2"}, "41": {"fulltext": "THE FARM. 35\\nwatcliecl you from my cliamber-window as\\nweird and wild you battled with storms. The\\nwhistlino^ of a fierce winter s wind throuo:li a\\no o\\nforest of pines is a mournful sound it seems\\nlike a prolonged wail of the persecuted trees.\\nISTo tree has a more strikino; mission than the\\npine. It is the vanguard tree of nature.\\nGrand, erect, beautiful, it enriches the low,\\nsandy plain climbing, strong and aggressive,\\never climbing, it lies prone against the moun-\\ntain-side, clothing it with eternal verdure.\\nThere is something pathetic in the wild ges-\\nticulations of these brave trees, flinging out\\ntheir stinted and shrunken arm-like branches\\nin defiance to the winds stretching them back\\nfrom the mountain-sides towards the valleys,\\nuntil, planted among the clouds, they wax\\nfrigid and dumb and dead.", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0041.jp2"}, "42": {"fulltext": "CHAPTER III.\\nTHE FAEM-HOUSE.\\nBack through the green lane again to the old\\nfarm-house. I gently push open a door which\\nleads into a hall, wherein I have sported away\\nmany a day in childhood. At the other end\\nof this hall is another door, through which\\ncame, forty years ago, the odor of sweet-Jbrier\\nand honeysuckle. I tiptoe across the fragile\\nfloor and look out. Field-scents greet me, so\\nfamiliar that I am almost dazed into believing\\nthat many things have not been, and that the\\ndear old days have come back. Once a bench\\nand basin stood beside this door, where tired\\nlaborers used to make themselves tidy for their\\nmeals. Just beyond was a kitchen-garden, with\\na beehive close by, and a grindstone under a\\nmaple. Bench and basin, hive and stone are\\ngone, and burdocks and plantain have taken\\nthe place of homely vegetables but the sap-\\nling little Benny planted has grown into a\\nmassive tree. Who would have thought to\\nhave tracked him after a lapse of more than\\nforty years Is this not a true spirit com-\\n36", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0042.jp2"}, "43": {"fulltext": "THE FARM-HOUSE. 37\\nmunion, tliis catching glimpses, among the\\nshadows of the long past, of dear faces\\nwhich have not grown old this wistful turn-\\ning back towards the sunshine of our earlier\\ndays\\nMy grandfather s kitchen was a sombre\\nroom, ceiled and painted brown w^itli huge\\nbeams, high dressers, and yawning fireplace.\\nIt had only two small windows, and was en-\\ntered by nine doors. It w^as in reality the\\ngreat hall of the house. What it lacked by\\nday was light and sunshine. At night, bright-\\nened by a roaring backlog, it was full of cheer.\\nThen its beams and ceilings and simple fur-\\nnishings were enriched by shadows, and the\\npewter dishes upon its brown dressers shone in\\ndancing firelight like silver. The two shelves,\\nfull of leather-covered books the weatherw^ise\\nalmanac, hanging from a peg the cross-legged\\ntable and prim chairs the long crane, with\\nits hissing teakettle the brush the bellows\\nthe settle in the corner, and whatever else was\\nthere, all became fire-changed, and were mel-\\nlowed into the brio^ht scene. This room was\\nby night the best part of the house. It was\\nalways the true heart of it; that vital centre\\nfrom which diver o^ed its indwellino- life. It\\nwas the place where people lounged and lin-\\ngered. Because its small windows let in few", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0043.jp2"}, "44": {"fulltext": "38 ^EW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nsunbeams, tliose wliicli did come in were all\\nthe more precious. Because it was full of\\nhomely things, and was, as the women said,\\nmost convenient, it had inwrought into it,\\nas a picture, a quaint beauty of adaptation.\\nMellow, brown old kitchens, how many costly\\nrooms simulate, in their furnishings, your in-\\nexpensive colors\\nThere was a dignity in the domestic labor\\nof my grandfather s kitchen. Its workers\\nwrested from the humility of their vocation\\nsome measure of that beauty which would\\nhave been thrust upon them by more gracious\\nconditions of life. Their daily walk was nar-\\nrow it was almost bounded by their kitchen\\nbut this latter was glorified by firelight and\\nconsecrated by use. The simple harmony of\\nit, which has made it a charming thing of\\nmemory, was reflected upon these women.\\nThey became a part of it, and, as such, they\\nare not drudges in plain garments, but quaintly-\\ncostumed life-studies in a picture of a delight-\\nful old room.\\nI can see now my stately grandmother pre-\\nparing her noontide meal. Her checked\\napron and muslin cap were spotlessly clean,\\nand she handled her clumsy utensils with a be-\\ncoming deftness. Hannah, the maid, hovered\\naround, ready to lend a helping hand. The", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0044.jp2"}, "45": {"fulltext": "THE FARM-HOUSE. 39\\ncrane, hung witli pots, kept up a constant siz-\\nzling, and covered pans spluttered from ember-\\nheaps in the corner. There was no hurry, no\\nbustle, no rattling of dishes. Hannah blew\\na tin horn from the back-door. There was a\\nswashing at the little bench outside. The\\ncrane was swung out covers were lifted\\npans were taken from the corners with per-\\nfect order the dinner passed from the fire to\\nthe table, well cooked, sufficient, and whole-\\nsome. It was not daintily served, with cut-\\nglass and china, but it was full of the essence\\nof vitality, and had the merit of utter cleanli-\\nness. My grandmother presided over it with\\na serious dignity untaught by rules of eti-\\nquette and in no way was the discipline of\\nher household better shown than by the utter\\ndecorum of its meals.\\nThe kitchen floor was white and worn with\\nmuch scrubbing, hollows telling where its\\nbest seats by the hearth were. The doors\\nopened into rare rooms this one into a\\ngranite-walled dairy, as cool, clean, and com-\\npact as if it were cut from the solid rock.\\nThe next led into the cellar, full of compart-\\nments and bins and dark closets, crammed in\\nwinter with farm products. This storehouse\\nnever failed. Its apples were wild things, but\\ntoothsome, for they were the best from a great", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0045.jp2"}, "46": {"fulltext": "40 ^EW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\norchard, and one scented them from the stair-\\nway out of a long line of barrels. Nothing\\ncan quite equal for richness the flavor which a\\nyear s ripeness pours into a farm-house. It\\nis only found in country homes, this con-\\ndensed sweetness, which has gone out of all\\nthe months of the year into the fashioning\\nof the many things which were heaped and\\nhoarded at the gathering in of the harvest.\\nHow fruits stored in old cellars kept their\\nfreshness That of one apple-tree in particu-\\nlar, at my grandfather s, never got its true\\nripeness until late in April. When fii-st har-\\nvested it was crabbed, puckering the mouth.\\nIt was a tiny, bright fruit, profusely mottling\\nits tree with crimson. It shrank and withered\\nby keeping but it grew palatable in inverse\\nratio to its size. I remember a branch, broken\\noff by accident, which carried its relish into\\nthe days of June. It was a pretty thing, hang-\\ning from the cellar-wall, a hardy waif from\\nthe dead harvest of the past year.\\nTwo doors led into bedrooms, in which\\nwere chests of drawers full of homespun linen.\\nOver the dairy ran the stairway, leading to\\nchambers severely simple in furnishing, but\\nclean, and made bright by sunshine. The\\nfloors of these chambers were kept strewn with\\nsand, a cheap, changeful covering, which", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0046.jp2"}, "47": {"fulltext": "THE FARM-HOUSE. 41\\nat night I used to scrawl over with skeleton\\npictures, to be scattered in the morning-.\\nThe doors mostly opened with iron latches.\\nThese latches were clumsy things, lifting by\\na thumb-piece with a sharp click, and send-\\ning a shiver through one on frosty days. On\\nthe shed doors, made of wood, they were\\ndrawn up by the traditional bobbin. Brass\\nknobs adorned the doors of the spare room.\\nThese were kept polished, and were held in\\nhigh esteem. Their machinery, shut into a\\nclumsy iron case, was screwed upon the out-\\nside of the door. As works of art none of\\nthese fastenings were much to be commended,\\nbut as quaint appendages to their homely doors\\nwere the best latches I have ever known.\\nThe west room was the family keeping-\\nroom, also lighted up at night by a roaring\\nbacklog. The brush and bellows in this\\nroom were pretentious with green and gold,\\nand the shovel and poker were headed with\\nbrass knobs but the fire was not a whit\\nmore cheerful than that in the brown kitchen.\\nI have sat hour after hour in that kitchen\\nwatching the backlog s slow consumption,\\nhalf blinding my eyes with its flickering\\nbrightness. It was a long-dying, companion-\\nable thing, taking strong hold upon a child s\\nfancy. It had been dragged to its place in", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0047.jp2"}, "48": {"fulltext": "42 NEW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nthe early morning, snow-bound and sliaggy.\\nIt was defiant of its fate, and fought against\\nit through the whole day. It truly died by\\ninches. From its ends sizzled and dropped\\nits sap, its true life-blood its substance fell\\noff ring by ring; its ashes settled slowly upon\\nthe hearth. Everybody hacked at it; it was\\nconstantly plied with shovel, tongs, and poker;\\nsparks flew furiously coals flaked off; by de-\\ngrees the log grew thin in the middle. At\\nlast a solid blow finished it it snapped, and\\nthe parted ends fell without the iron dogs\\nthe brands were ready to be raked up the\\nbacklog was no more. Its life was jocund\\nand brilliant. It was eloquent with fiery\\ntongues, and the stories it told to a child,\\nwith crackling voice, went not out with its\\nsmoke.\\nFarmers were not stingy with their fuel, for\\nthe brush in the woodlands grew faster than\\nthey could burn the ancient trees. My grand-\\nfather s backlogs were drawn through the\\nhouse on a hand-sled, snowy, mossy things,\\ndripping with sap and shaggy with bark.\\nThey were buried in embers, and then sup-\\nplemented with a forelog, which, in its own\\nturn, was plied with lighter fuel and bolstered\\nup with iron dogs. The building of this pile\\nwas an art; and the practical farmer knew", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0048.jp2"}, "49": {"fulltext": "THE FARM-HOUSE. 43\\nhow to adjust the size of the log to the day s\\nconsumption, so that it was quite sure to\\nshatter and break in season for the early\\nraking up of the night. This raking up\\nat my grandfather s was his own care and it\\nwas thought worthy of note in an alm^anac\\nwhen, once upon a time, his coals had failed\\nto keep, and a fresh supply was brought from\\na neighbor s half a mile away. The ashes of\\nthose ancient wood-fires were full of virtue.\\nThey went to leach in spring for the making\\nof family soap, and spread their richness far\\nand wide over hungry fields.\\nThe west room of the old farm-house was\\nmost cheerful in long winter evenings not\\nmade so by social life or by artificial adorn-\\nments, but rather by a sweet peace, and by\\nthe rich gifts of its outlying world. With\\nface flattened against its window-panes, I, a\\nnature-loving child, peered out at the glitter-\\ning mill-pond and the dark woodland traced\\nthe thread of a highway caught the sound of\\ntransient bells made friends w^ith snow and\\nclouds and shadows, and came to love its wild\\nwinter scenery. Without a love for nature\\nlife in this isolated farm-house, through the\\nwinter months, to one unused to it, must have\\nbeen lonely and monotonous. In February,\\nwhen the lane almost daily filled with snow.", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0049.jp2"}, "50": {"fulltext": "44 ^^W ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nmy grandfatlier opened a highway through\\nthe upper field. This was more easily kept\\nclear, but it failed to entice many comers.\\nPeople hugged their firesides through winter\\nsnows, and learned to be content. There\\nwas a largeness about the home-life of ancient\\nwell-to-do country people. They had space,\\ngreat houses, and great rooms; and if they\\nhad little show, they had at least no shams.\\nTheir houses needed few furnishings, because\\nso much embellishment was given to them by\\nnature. Through many years, vivid and beau-\\ntiful, have stood by me the rare adornments\\nof my grandfather s great house. They were\\nskies and woods and water and far-off hills let\\nin through its windows; the shifting aspects\\nof winter snows and summer verdure and\\nmany especial revelations from earth and sky.\\nIt was a great house, so large that its uncar-\\npeted chambers gave back an echo to my foot-\\nsteps; and I never went up to its garret, which\\nI did seldom and softly, without a feeling of\\nloneliness. This garret was a weird place,\\nwith shelves and scaffolds packed with the\\nwaste of years, and its beams hung with dried\\nherbs. It was dimly lighted by two small\\ngable windows, and at the head of the stair-\\nway was cut in two by a rambling old chimney.\\nMore than any other spot in the house it had", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0050.jp2"}, "51": {"fulltext": "THE FARM-HOUSE. 45\\nthe air of age and decay. Its dealings appeared\\nto be wholly with the past, and things out of\\nwhich life had gone. All that was in it looked\\nas if it had belonged to another century and\\nherbs filled the air with a sickish, musty smell.\\nIt was so far away from the living-rooms that\\nfew sounds of busy in-door life ever reached it.\\nIt was a gray ghost of a chamber, in which\\nnobody had ever lived a sort of burial-place\\nfor worn-out and faded things. It was delight-\\nful to come down from it into the brighter\\nrooms, which seemed, all of them, to be per-\\nvaded by some savory odor. Dried lavender\\nand rose-leaves sent out their scents from\\nchests and drawers the dairy, the cellar, the\\ncheese-room had each their own flavor; and\\nthe best essence of every edible seemed to dis-\\nengage itself over the open fire. Johnny-cakes\\nbaked in the corner pies cooked in the oven\\nmeat roasted on the spit; potatoes boiled in\\npots and from them all into the room came\\nappetizing steams.\\nThe old folks talked but little in winter\\nevenings. My grandmother s knitting-work\\ndropped stitches now and then, which she\\ndrowsily picked up with an Oh, dear suz!\\nMy grandfather, sitting opposite to her, by\\none corner of the hearth, dozed, with the\\nruddy firelight mocking at his wrinkles.", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0051.jp2"}, "52": {"fulltext": "46 NEW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nAcross tliem both, on tlie chest of drawers,\\non the bed-curtains, on the tall clock, on the\\nwhite walls, danced this same firelight; ont\\nthrough the small panes it streamed over\\nthe waste of snow into the highway, cheer-\\ning the cold traveller bright, beautiful home-\\nlight. Peaceful, long-seeming, dreamy winter\\nevenings, you made one used to the sighing\\nof winds, the roaring of storms, the cold glit-\\nter of snow; and you taught one, through\\nisolation, to find how much there is that is\\nbeautiful and satisfying to be gotten out of\\nthe roughest aspects and moods of nature you\\nalso taught how simple may be the resources\\nof a true home-life.\\nThe door on the other side of the front\\nentry opened into the east room. This was\\nthe best room, or, as my grandfather called\\nit, the fore room. Most noticeable of its\\nfurnishing was the bed, more for show than\\nuse. It was a tall structure, built up of corn-\\nhusks and feathers, not to be leaned against\\nor carelessly indented. Its blue and white\\nchecked canopy, edged with knotted fringe,\\nsuspended by hooks from the ceiling, was\\nspun and dyed and woven by the women of\\nthe household. Every piece of linen they\\nused was of their own make. A pillow-case\\nfrom that house is marked in plain letters", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0052.jp2"}, "53": {"fulltext": "THE FARM-HOUSE. 47\\nA. D., meaning Abigail Drake, who spun and\\nwove it there more than eighty years ago.\\nThe letters are stitched in with yellow silk\\n(it must once have been black) after an ancient\\nsampler. This sampler was a curious thing,\\nrunning through the alphabet and numerals\\nin several texts and various-colored silks,\\npunctuated at the end by two skeleton birds,\\nand winding up with this wise maxim, In-\\ndustry is its own reward. It also announced\\nin written text that Abigail Drake, at the\\nage of twelve, in such a year, wrought this\\nsampler.\\nSuch samplers were worked by girls in the\\nvillage schools. Their letters were pricked in\\nand out w^ith extreme care, and the best exe-\\ncuted of them were generally framed and hung\\nin the fore room. They were as precious to\\nthose who made them as if they had been rare\\nwater-colors, and the measure of a young\\nwoman s accomplishment was taken from the\\nskill with which she had done this task. As\\nrags, these old samplers are worthless now\\nas the faded work of bright young girls of a\\npast century, they interest one for they are\\nfabrics into which, in long ago summer days,\\nwere inwrought some of the old-fashioned\\nsimplicity and patience and industry of a dead\\ngeneration.", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0053.jp2"}, "54": {"fulltext": "48 NEW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nMy grandfather s flax was of good grain.\\nIts bed was just inside of the pasture-bars,\\nmaking a dainty show of blue blossoms.\\nThere could be nothing prettier in the way\\nof flowers than it was. Waving in the wind,\\nit seemed like a bit of summer sky let down.\\nIt was tended with great care, and harvested\\nand made ready for use with much labor.\\nFailure of the crop by untoward weather,\\nor any mishap in its preparation, was looked\\nupon as a great misfortune.\\nIn long summer afternoons my grandmother\\nand Hannah planted their little wheels by the\\nback-door, and hour after hour drew out the\\npliant threads which were to be woven, in the\\nloom up-stairs, into variously patterned cover-\\nlets, table-cloths, and towels. One is touched\\nin handling, at this remote day, the fabrics\\nfashioned by these ancient women. It seems\\nas if they had woven into them a warp and\\nwoof of their own vitality, and that the\\nstrength which went out of the patient work-\\ners entered into their webs, and gave to them\\na texture of beauty and endurance. This old\\nfarm-house pillow-case of mine is as firm as\\nif its fibre had been plucked from the flax-\\nbed but yesterday, and it is as lustrous as it\\nwas Avhen the fingers which wove it first cut\\nit from the beam. To nothing does the past", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0054.jp2"}, "55": {"fulltext": "THE FARM-HOUSE. 49\\ncling more than to such ancient cloths. The\\nthreads you handle, which moth and mildew\\nhave marred, are not the real thing that is\\na finer undershot, impalpable to touch of\\nstranger, but trailing down to you, like silken\\nfolds, glittering and precious with tenderest\\nmemories.\\nHow many operations of breaking and\\nbleaching and boiling those home products\\nhad to go through before they came out at\\nlast faultless as the fruits of foreio;n looms\\nThe bureau, in the fore room, was always\\ncrammed with fine twined linens, white as\\nsnow, and scented with lavender and rose-\\nleaves. How did those women accomplish so\\nmuch I look back upon them with pride\\nand wonder; for my grandmother was no\\ndrudge she was a true lady. Never was\\nthere a more dignified or better bred woman\\nthan she; never the mistress of a more well-\\nordered household. She was never hurried,\\nnever behindhand with her work; was given\\nto hospitality, and was tasteful in her dress.\\nVery few, in those days, were the complica-\\ntions of daily living; still I marvel how my\\ngrandmother managed to be so cultivated and\\nso elegant, and yet sit, hour after hour, at the\\nloom, plying her shuttle with no less persistence\\nthan, in spinning, she drew out her threads.", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0055.jp2"}, "56": {"fulltext": "5 NE W ENGL A ND B YG ONES.\\nAcross the huge beams, under and over\\neach other, crossed and recrossed these threads,\\nlike a spider s web. I know by what manifold\\ntoil they were gotten there by reeling, sizing,\\nspooling, and warping, before my grandmother\\ncould beo:in to throw her shuttle. The work\\nwas slow, but it never flagged. Threads were\\nbroken and carefully taken up; quills gave\\nout, and were patiently renewed; the web\\ngrew, thread by thread, inch by inch; the\\nintricate pattern came out upon the surface,\\nand pleased the weaver s eye; neighbors\\ndropped in and gossiped over and about\\nit. The days wore on; the worker never\\nfailed at her beam; until, most likely at the\\nclose of some long summer s afternoon, the\\nend of the warp was reached; the treadles\\nstopped; the web was done. How delighted\\nthe women used to be with their woven fabric,\\nso slowly constructed, so quickly unwound\\nThey stretched it out, clipped its hanging\\nthreads, held it up to the light, and stroked\\nand caressed it as if it were a living thing.\\nIt would have been a mean web indeed had\\nit brought them no high satisfaction. It may\\nhave been that spinning and weaving, by long\\npractice, grew to be a sort of unconscious me-\\nchanical process that the w^orkers, in their\\nlong hours of monotonous employment, were", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0056.jp2"}, "57": {"fulltext": "THE FABM-HOUSE. 51\\ngiven to meditation; and thus, from their\\ndouble vocation, came perhaps that air of\\nserious dignity common among the better\\nclass of farm-house women.\\nN^o thing could be more picturesque or\\nprettier, in country life, than the little flax-\\nwheel, with well-filled distaff, being plied in\\na shady doorway by comely matron or rosy\\nlass. The loom, with its web and weaver,\\nmade a classic picture and its continuous\\nthud, sounding hour after hour from an upper\\nroom, was a symbol of that pathetic patience\\nwhich entered so largely into the lives of\\nworking women.\\nThe fore room was seldom used. It was\\nrather a store-room for household treasures\\nfor such things as had been bought with hard-\\nearned money were highly prized by these\\nsimple people. Its furniture was the costliest\\nand most modern, as well as the ugliest, in the\\nhouse. It was a sort of show-room. The\\nchina and glass in its cupboard were marvel-\\nlously fine, and have come down as heir-\\nlooms. They are suggestive of the tendencies\\nand tastes of women, who are traditionally\\nmost charming, through simplicity, because,\\nfrom the force of their condition, their lives\\ncould not be otherwise than simple. Their\\nmerit, therefore, is not so much in the fact", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0057.jp2"}, "58": {"fulltext": "52 ^JSW ENGLAND B YG ONES.\\nthat tliey lived so near nature, which they\\ncould not help doing, ^that they took to\\nthemselves a beauty of which they knew\\nnot, as that, while possessing the common\\ninstincts of woman, they bore burdens with\\nheroic patience, and, through long, hard-\\nworked lives, kept up a holiday simulation\\nof that ease and luxury which was not their\\nown.\\nA narrow flight of stairs led, from the front\\nentry, up to the guest-chambers. One of them\\nwas haunted. The ghost of this ro/)m was a\\nharmless thing. A child of the house. Oily\\nby name, had been found crushed in the wood-\\nland by a fallen tree. It was so long ago that\\nhis little grave had sunk far below its fellows\\nyet his memory had been kept fresher than\\nthe turf above it by the legend of this east\\nchamber. Its furnishings were quaint and\\nhomely a huge oaken chest of drawers, rush-\\nbottomed chairs, and a low bedstead hung with\\nchecked brown and white linen. Between\\nthe two front windows was a looking-glass in\\na queer little frame, with a silhouette picture\\nof m}^ grandfather and grandmother on either\\nside of it. In a cupboard by the chimney\\nwas a set of fine china, painted in flowing\\nblue.\\nIn through its windows came the eternal,", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0058.jp2"}, "59": {"fulltext": "THE FARM-HOUSE. 53\\never-shifting glory of the outlying landscape.\\nAs I looked out of these windows on summer\\nmornings, my heart grew full, like a heart\\ntouched by love, so profuse in variety and\\nbeauty was the scenery of this wild, lonely\\nspot.", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0059.jp2"}, "60": {"fulltext": "CHAPTER lY.\\nSPRING-TIME AND HAYING.\\nThere is no end to the coquetry of a J^ew\\nEngland spring. Some early March morning\\nyou look out upon a waste of snow. You are\\nweary of it you long to see life and growth\\nand verdure come into the dead landscape.\\nOld winter flings back against the pane scuds\\nof snow and sleet. Then come dark days,\\nclinging mists and warm rains, trying to pa-\\ntience and evil for invalids. Little water chan-\\nnels, with a melancholy gurgle, undermine the\\nsnow-banks. There is everywhere a gradual\\nsubsidence of surface. Tops of tall rocks peep\\nout; highways get to be wellnigh impassable\\ncellars grow wet; brooks begin to roar and\\nrivers to rise there is a universal sizzling\\nand steaming. This grizzly, dispiriting com-\\nmotion is the birth-throe of spring. Shortly\\nthe mossy housetops begin to smoke the\\nfields and pastures are full of bare knolls\\nand patches fences, which have been winter-\\nburied, once more zigzag through the land-\\nscape, and dark lines mark the lanes and high-\\n54", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0060.jp2"}, "61": {"fulltext": "SPRING-TIME AND HAYING. 55\\nways. Leaf-buds swell, and the frosts of the\\nnight melt before the morning sunshine. Lit-\\ntle boys trundle their sap-buckets through the\\npastures, and you see that the yearly marvel of\\nverdure is being inwrought into the branches\\nand twigs of the bare forests. Another season\\nof seed-time and harvest will be born unto\\nyou.\\nChimney corners are deserted farmers be-\\ngin to bestir themselves. They sort over their\\nseeds, put in repair their farm utensils, and,\\nbefore they get fully harnessed to their out-of-\\ndoor work, attend to their town affairs. What\\ncountry-bred boy or girl does not remember\\nthat yearly meeting, when all the voters of\\nthe town swarmed about its great, bare hall,\\nand cast into the ballot-box those tickets the\\nmaking up of which had cost months of logic\\nin the village stores and much hard feeling\\namong honest neighbors All the children\\nwere politicians that day and the moderator,\\ngenerally chosen for bis loud voice, was as dis-\\ntinguished to them as if he had been made\\nPresident of the whole republic. The elective\\nprocess was a slow one; often so hotly con-\\ntested that the count for representative to Gen-\\neral Court was hardly reached at nightfall.\\nThe little boys who peddled molasses candy\\n(most of it badly burned) gave out the bulletins", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0061.jp2"}, "62": {"fulltext": "56 ^EW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nof its progress. The slumpy drifts had to be\\ncut down beforehand to make the roads passa-\\nble, over which, when their votes were needed,\\nthe feeble old men were taken at the expense\\nof their party. The breaking up of the meet-\\ning w^as shown, to waiting housewives, by\\nthe thickening on the highway of returning\\nfarmers, most of them laden with budgets of\\ngingerbread and candy. The women were as\\nanxious for news as if there had been a great\\nbattle, and the zest of the day, to the chil-\\ndren, was only surpassed by that of the annual\\nmuster.\\nThis muster, or training day, as it w^as\\nmore often called, was their best holiday, when\\nthe militia was drilled in a vacant lot of some\\nfortunate town. What child ever forgot that\\nshow when once seen As an early experience\\nor a remembered picture, what could surpass\\nit? How^ real the soldiers were with their\\nmuskets and bright uniforms What a great\\nman the captain was And the drum-major,\\nwho ever saw his like What a marvel of dis-\\ncipline the soldiers showed what uniformity\\nof step what skill in evolution wdiat success\\nof officers in horsemanship All day long\\nthey went through their drills, and the gaping\\ncrowd stared and marvelled, half taking this\\nplay for a real thing and these men for true", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0062.jp2"}, "63": {"fulltext": "SPRING-TIME AND HAYING. 57\\nsoldiers. Before daylight, from the country\\nmiles around, wagons full of living freight be-\\ngan to pour into the field, until it was half\\npacked with sight-seers. These wagons were\\ndrawn close up by the wall as a safe place for\\nthe girls and younger children. The unhar-\\nnessed horses, to be kept quiet with hay, were\\ntied close by, and the larger boys got astride\\nthe wall or climbed into neighboring trees.\\nBooths were put up, and pedlers carts stood\\nthick in an inner ring. Gingerbread and\\ncandy were the staple articles of trade, with\\nsuch bright gauds as would be likely to catch\\nan uncritical eye. It was the custom for lasses\\nto receive presents on this day, and because of\\nthis many a hard-earned penny was foolishly\\nspent. It was amusing to see the plain farmers\\ngoing about with their red bandanna handker-\\nchiefs (show things) full of gingerbread, the\\nextent of their day s dissipation. It was good\\ngingerbread, with a sort of training flavor,\\nwhich died out with the giving up of the cus-\\ntom of the day. At noon, when the soldiers\\ndispersed for dinner, the most adventurous\\nboys followed the great officers to the tavern,\\nand looked in at the windows to see them eat,\\nwhispering to each other of the prowess of\\nthese dangerous men. It was not considered\\nrespectable for young girls to wander about\\n5", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0063.jp2"}, "64": {"fulltext": "58 NEW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\namong the crowd, so they lunched in the\\nwagons, or on the greensward by them, and\\ntheir nooning was the harvest of the dealers\\nin gingerbread.\\nThe climax of the drill was the firing off of\\nthe guns, which brought many an urchin down\\nfrom his perch as quickly as if he had been\\nshot in the head. Unbred horses did not\\nrelish the day, and were constantly making\\nlittle side stampedes, no less exciting than the\\ndrill itself. A shower took all the feather\\nand glory out of the show, and sent soldiers\\nflying in front of the crowd. Before nightfall\\nparties got mixed. Soldiers mistook them-\\nselves for citizens, and citizens forgot the defer-\\nence due to soldiers. It was generally grow-\\ning to be truly warlike, when at order of the\\ngreat captain the trainers, led by music of\\nbugle and drum, marched magnificently from\\nthe field. The crowd waited. Men, women,\\nand children seemed to devour with their eyes\\nthis departing glory this toy pageant, which\\nhad given them a merry day this mock sol-\\ndiery, which had simulated patriotic virtue\\nthis thing, which was not foolish because it\\nwas so real to them. When it had fairly passed\\nout of sight each went his and her own way,\\nand, almost before the drum had stopped play-\\ning its marching tune, the field was deserted.", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0064.jp2"}, "65": {"fulltext": "SPRING-TIME AND HAYING. 59\\nBy the first of May morning sunshine begins\\nto have power, and through your windows\\ncomes the gladsome gush of spring birds. The\\nburied life of nature has burst its cerements\\nthe earth is mellowing trees are leaving, and\\nsods are waiting to be turned. Here and there,\\nunder the shady side of fences or on distant\\nhill-tops, lie strips of dingy snow. You do not\\nmind them, for your feet walk over crisp\\nmosses and tender grass you rustle aside last\\nyear s perished leaves for arbutus, and close\\nbeside these same snow-strips you find violets.\\nAnon the landscape grows picturesque with\\nthe blue frocks and red shirts of farm laborers,\\nwith ploughs and bonfires and oxen and chil-\\ndren and slowly-moving carts.\\nTo the farmer there seems to be no end to\\nspring labor. Sowing and planting over, the\\nupspringing seed is to be carefully watched\\nand tended. Each day brings its weight of\\never-varying cares. The IN^ew England farmer\\nof moderate means truly gets his bread by the\\nsweat of his brow. The vegetables and grains,\\nwhich make up so large a portion of his fare,\\nare raised by dint of prudent forecast, and the\\nbringing to bear of much practical philosophy\\nupon stingy soil. In the spring, my grand-\\nfather and his one man-servant, with an occa-\\nsional day of foreign help, were equal to the", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0065.jp2"}, "66": {"fulltext": "60 ^EW ENGL A ND B YG ONES.\\nwork of the farm. But in hajing-time, tlirice\\na day, a score or more of stout-limbed laborers\\ngathered around my grandfather s board, and\\nthe cupboard in the brown kitchen groaned\\nunder its weight of hearty viands. Sudden\\nshowers brought over willing neighbors, and\\nnow and then a traveller would stop a day or\\ntwo to lend a helping hand. My grandmother\\nheld these transients in low esteem.\\nThese old !N^ew England farmers were apt\\nto be close with their money. Who could\\nblame them if they were The gain^ of most\\nof them came by slow accretions, and their\\nlives were at warfare with the elements. They\\nwere generous in personal service, and where\\nthey would grudgingly give you a penny, they\\ndid not hesitate to use their strength for you.\\nThey were watchful to help with your exposed\\nharvest, and they pitched and pulled and tugged\\nand sweat for you without thought of reward.\\nThey were a well-informed class. Seen plant-\\ning and hoeing their corn and potatoes, in\\ndusty and uncouth attire, they seemed like\\npatient animals. In talking with them one\\nwas astonished at their intelligence, begotten\\nof their application and their dealings with\\nnature. They had been well taught geography,\\ngrammar, and arithmetic. If a broad provin-\\ncialism marred their speech, it was not because", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0066.jp2"}, "67": {"fulltext": "SPRING-TIME AND HAYING. 61\\nthey knew little of the construction of lan-\\nguage. They were apt with rules, and were\\nbetter versed in the laws, which ought to have\\nmoulded their words, than many men and\\nwomen of politer tongue. They were learned\\nin whatever pertained to their craft, only that\\ntheir knowledge was marred by a certain ob-\\nstinate credulity. Students of almanacs, they\\nbecame weatherwise from watching the clouds.\\nClinging to the traditions of their fathers, they\\nwere still not unskilful chemists for the soils\\nwhich made up their own farms. They learned\\nfrom practice the right rotation of crops, and\\nthriftily turned their farm-waste into food for\\ntheir fields. They cared little for trees or\\nshrubs or flowers, but readily fenced out for\\nthe housewife a sunny garden-patch. Weeds\\ninfested their fields and marred their crops\\nchildren trampled down their grass thieving\\nbirds pecked at their corn and grain. They\\nwere a much-tried race, w^ith sun and wind as\\noften working them ill as good, yet they kept\\ntheir courage and tempers marvellously well.\\nRough, with an undercurrent of softness not\\ncultivated yet wise nursed by nature and led\\nby Bible precepts above all they pleased you\\nby the healthy content with which they ac-\\ncepted their condition.\\nIn winter, sitting on wooden benches by the", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0067.jp2"}, "68": {"fulltext": "62 NEW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nstoves of country stores, they used to discourse\\nand take counsel together. They much loved\\ndiscussion, and party spirit ran high. Af-\\nfairs of town and State and nation were\\nhandled with rude but close logic. These\\nstores were queer places, full of all sorts of\\ncommodities, smelling strong of codfish, mo-\\nlasses, and snuff, and too often of l^ew Eng-\\nland rum. In long summer afternoons the\\nhumbler class of farmers wives went to them\\nto exchange dairy products for dry goods and\\ngroceries. A fresh supply of storekeepers\\nwares made a great stir. The women over-\\nlooked and talked about the meagre stock, and\\nstrung washed samples of its calicoes upon\\ntheir windows-sills to dry. They used to go\\npast my grandfather s, to the store beyond the\\nmiller s red cottage, with wooden boxes tied\\nup in squares of white cotton. These were\\nfull of butter. The more opulent of them\\ndrove clumsy wagons filled with various farm\\nproducts good for barter.\\nSimple shoppers, but makers of rare bar-\\ngains, inasmuch as the stuffs you bought\\nbrought you solid comfort and true delight.\\nThey washed well and wore well, and the\\nsilk and sheen, which were not in their real\\ntexture, were imparted to them by the satisfac-\\ntion which you had in them. Country maideng", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0068.jp2"}, "69": {"fulltext": "SPRING-TIME AND HAYING. 63\\nfitted their calicoes with care, and wore them\\nwith exquisite neatness. If they overrated\\nthe fineness, the dyes and the becomingness of\\nthe fabrics, it was because their color blind-\\nness and their worldly ignorance helped them\\nto be made satisfied and happy by very little\\nthings. They were as acceptable to each other\\nand to their sweethearts in calico as they\\nwould have been, fashion taught, in silks and\\nlaces.\\nThe candies of these stores were the delight\\nof children. The red and white hearts shut\\nup in dingy, brass-mouthed jars were in reality\\nstale, but to the buyers of them the freshness\\nwhich they lacked was given to them by their\\nrarity.\\nThe keepers of the stores, having leisure,\\nwere apt to be men of much intelligence. I\\nfound one of them, on an August day, sitting\\njust outside his shop, his- chair tilted back\\nagainst the wall, so wrapped up in a transla-\\ntion of Homer s Iliad that he had no ear for\\na bargain. His recreation only illustrated,\\nwhat is ever true of country life, that it holds\\nin silence and humility many thinkers. This\\nstore was perched upon a hill, in an out-of-the-\\nway place. All the inhabitants of the little\\nvillage seemed to be either at work or play in\\nits adjoining fields. He sat there alone, an", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0069.jp2"}, "70": {"fulltext": "64 NEW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nold man, tall, massive, wliite-liaired, Ms face\\nbeneficent with the peace of an untroubled\\nlife. He peered from over his iron-bound\\nspectacles, keeping his place in his book with\\nhis forefinger, and answered my questions in\\nan abstracted way, as if I were a bother to\\nhim. He was a beautiful picture of a vigor-\\nous happy old age. The pomps and vanities\\nand vexations of society were nothing to him,\\nand yet he was consorting with the best; and\\nthe glory of intellect and of age, and the bright\\nsplendor of the summer s day, wrapped him\\nabout like a garment.\\nThe rum of those country stores made ter-\\nrible drunkards, whose vices and idiosyn-\\ncrasies were brought out, by their isolation,\\nwith clear-cut distinctness. Their wives were\\nwhite-faced, hopeless women; their houses\\nwere dismal with the signs of a drunkard s\\nunthrift. The whole tragedy was so plainly\\nstamped that he who ran might read. ^N o\\nhome was ever so little of a home as that of a\\ndrunkard in the country no life ever seemed\\nso utterly unnatural, so warped a life as his.\\nThe very blessings of his inheritance mocked\\nat him. Space and quiet and sunshine and\\nverdure, and every other thing which especially\\nmarks country life, only made more apparent\\nhis poverty and degradation. One could always", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0070.jp2"}, "71": {"fulltext": "SPRING-TIME AND HAYING. 65\\ntell the home of a drunkard, with its clap-\\nboards and shingles slipping oiF; its windows\\nstuffed with rags its unhinged doors its\\ntumbling outbuildings, shattered, ragged, lean-\\ning, tottering, solemn with the unutterable\\npathos of a lost life.\\nIf you have never lived in the country, you\\ncan have no idea what grim and strange and\\nrepulsive spectacles these men become, on the\\nsurface of its pure, calm, undemonstrative life.\\nI recall three who, on town-meeting and\\ntraining days, used to stagger up and down\\nthe highways. Children shrank from them as\\nif they had been lepers. One of them had\\nchildren of his own, who grew up rough and\\nwicked, and became the outlaws of the neigh-\\nborhood to whom the fair landscape was only\\na field for plunder, and against whom the\\nhearts of all the village people seemed to be\\nturned. God forgive them circumstance was\\nhard upon them, they were only drunkard s\\nchildren.\\nAnother was once possessed of a brilliant\\nintellect. Poor, lost man his house was the\\nforlornest of all perched high on a hill,\\ntumbling, and fluttering with rags. His large\\nand once valuable farm was overrun with\\nbrambles. His wife was never seen outside\\nher wretched home. Her existence grew", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0071.jp2"}, "72": {"fulltext": "QQ NEW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nto be a sort of myth. She died and was\\nburied, and no one missed her.\\nJim, who danced in his cups, was foolish\\nand diverting to the youngsters; still his\\nantics seemed disgustingly uncouth in the\\ndecorous quiet of a country town.\\nWhen a young child, I went to the sale of\\na drunkard s home with the lawyer who had\\nthe foreclosure of a mortgage upon it. If I\\nlive to be a hundred years old I shall never\\nforget that sale. The place had once been a\\nfruitful one, and had come down from father\\nto son through several generations. Drunk-\\nenness had wrested it from the hands of him\\nfrom whom it was to be sold. The man s wife\\nwas a handsome but heart-broken woman. I\\nshall never behold a look of more utter despair\\nthan that which her face wore that day. It\\nwas a harsh scene I see and hear it all, the\\nmocking sunbeams the loud voice of the\\nauctioneer the coarse laughter of the crowd\\nthe woman, pacing the floor, sighing, never\\nspeaking, and as ghastly as if she had been\\namong the dead. The final bid came. With\\none wail she went out of the room, and I never\\nsaw her more.\\nThe processes by which the year brings about\\nher miracles are full of beauty. The hum-\\nblest farm laborer can take no working posture", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0072.jp2"}, "73": {"fulltext": "SPRING-TIME AND HAYING. 67\\nwhich will not be picturesque, framed into a\\nspring landscape. I recall the grain-sower\\nflinging broadcast his seed; frolicksome ur-\\nchins dropping the sprouting bulbs bonfires\\nfrom last year s stubble and new clearings,\\ngiving brown shadow to outl^ang verdure.\\nHoeing and ploughing and carting and cutting\\nand digging; the men who worked, and the\\nworks they fashioned, were moulded into the\\nearth s form and substance. It was as if the\\ncountry were an ever-shifting kaleidoscope,\\nconstantly changing old forms and hues into\\nnew shades and shapes.\\nIts marvels began with the breaking up of\\nbrooks, when they started to roar and tumble\\nand overflow their banks. The fish, which at\\nnight flashed by in these spring waters, gave a\\ntransient sport to men and boys, who sought\\nfor them by light of pitchpine torches. Flit-\\nting about with nets and spears, in the uncer-\\ntain blaze of their bonfires, their loud shouts\\nheard above the roaring of the stream, they\\ngave a weird aspect to the valley a charming\\nexaggeration of the untamed scenery of early\\nspring-time.\\nNothing gives more expression to a field or\\npasture than one of these brooks. Its wonders\\nnever cease. Its spring fury and overflow last\\nbut a few days. It is, in fact, a most placid", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0073.jp2"}, "74": {"fulltext": "08 NEW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\ntiling, rippling over smooth pebbles or pliant\\ngrass, pure, transparent, and enticing. It is\\nprettiest when running, in and out its tortuous\\nway, tbrough pasture-knolls, full of rocky fords,\\nits banks ricb with ferns and wild flag and\\norchis, or, better still, through the heart of\\nan old wood, where it grows mysterious, and\\nhugs to its soggy sides such plants as love\\nshade and moisture. A brook is one of the\\nfriendliest, sweetest things you can stumble\\nupon in your wanderings and the one which\\nyou first knew is remembered with much ten-\\nderness, the dense woodland from whence it\\ncame the ferns and pallid grass, which Avere\\nhalf dragged out with it; the pebbly bed, into\\nwhich it widened the dark pool, beloved by\\ntrout; the show of coltsfoot, beset by house-\\nwives the sharp-pointed rocks, which helped\\nyou over the patch of orchis, and the long\\nstretch of rushes the mint and the bog\\nonions, but why go on for this babbler was\\nmy brook and not yours\\nAs the season wore on grasses grew stout\\nand tall; heavy showers lodged them; and\\ntruant boys and girls made unthrifty paths\\nthrou2:h the fields. Farmers bes^an to whet\\ntheir scythes and plant their grindstones under\\nshady trees sure signs of coming haying.\\nThe delights of those hayings have outlasted", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0074.jp2"}, "75": {"fulltext": "SPRING-TIME AND HAYING. 69\\nyears, and the aroma of tliem still pervades\\nevery ripened field. Time has not changed\\nthe teeming life of nature. When I see little\\nheads hobbing up and down in yonder meadow\\nyellow with buttercups, I remember that straw-\\nberries used to grow where buttercups blos-\\nsomed. I:^ew shadows are chasing each other\\nover ripening grain familiar fruits lie every-\\nwhere the forest-trees, just as they used, over-\\nlap each other with shaded folds of intense\\nverdure. Fulness of sunshine falls every-\\nwhere on fulness of vegetation. Back to me,\\nthrouo-h the features of the present, come\\nmemories of the past.\\nLate in June I hear a familiar sound,\u00e2\u0080\u0094 the\\nsharp click of a scythe making a beginnhig\\nof the mid-year harvest. The year is waxing\\nold. The yellow stubble of the first-mown\\nfield tells that and it has a suggestive deso-\\nlateness. What odor so sweet as that of new-\\nmown hay? It is the breath of the dying\\ngrass, of which there is no wisp so small that,\\nwhen I sever it, it shall not send forth this\\ndelicious scent to tell me of bygone days of\\nabundant and beautiful harvests.\\nOf all the waste luxuriance which the earth\\npours forth in her yearly ripening, this^ is\\nthe most beautiful and beautifying. Lying\\nbroadcast upon fields, threading them in care-", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0075.jp2"}, "76": {"fulltext": "70 NEW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nless windrows flung together in heaps trail-\\ning from ladened carts crowning oxen and\\nlaborers with fantastic wreaths in whatever\\nplace it finds or flings itself, it is the same de-\\nlightful, sw^eet-scented, dying grass. There is\\nno earth so flat, no landscape so tame, that its\\nyearly hay harvest shall not undulate it into\\nlines of beauty. Up and down the dusty high-\\nway, jolting about uneven fields, the homely\\ncarts used to go, gathering up their precious\\nloads, slowly wreathing their rails and wheels\\nand shafts.\\nI can see my grandfather wiping the sweat\\nfrom his brow, and curiously eying the sky,\\ntreacherous sky, playing pranks with the\\nbest plans and labors, but all-creative in\\nputting new life into a summer landscape.\\nPiling up, snow-white, these clouds come,\\nsome hot August afternoon, out of the hori-\\nzon, very beautiful at first, but treacherous,\\nand the dread of hay-makers. They at once\\ndefine their edges with a soft-tinted rose color,\\nand grow apace. They roll on, with stately\\nmarch, towards the zenith, right over the\\nanxious workers and waiting harvests. Grow-\\ning angry, getting lurid, overlapping each\\nother with brazen folds, threatening, they\\nsound their warning of low-muttered thunder,\\ncondense their brightness into vivid lightning,", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0076.jp2"}, "77": {"fulltext": "SPRING-TIME AND HAYING. 71\\nand the whole ^kj grows dense and black with\\npent-up waters.\\nFarmers used to fly to each other s aid at\\nsuch times, running like bees about the fields,\\ngoading and urging on their laggard oxen,\\nBroad and Bright and Cherry and Star.\\nCarts strained and groaned like living things\\nclouds flew higher and higher little chil-\\ndren tugged in the eager race the hay blew\\nout in long streamers with the wild winds;\\nthe scurrying drops came thicker and thicker\\nthe storm burst at last when, as if by magic,\\nmen and oxen and teams vanished, and the\\nwind and rain had their way with the mown\\nand unmown grasses left in the fields.\\nThe noonings were bright features of a hay-\\ning landscape. At summons of horn, away\\nwent the workers through lanes and highways\\nto their noontide meal. More often, to save\\ntime, they took it in the field. I see and hear\\nit all, men stretching their brawny limbs\\nupon the hay-heaps oxen chewing the new-\\nmown grass under shadow of their loads bare-\\nfooted boys and girls scudding about with\\nlunch-pails and pitchers the drone of bees\\nthe chirrup of grasshoppers the babbling of\\nthe brook the lapping of the mill-pond and\\nmany undertones of nature brought out by\\nthe unusual quiet of this hour. Oh the peace,", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0077.jp2"}, "78": {"fulltext": "72 NEW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nthe glory, given b}^ those summer noonings to\\nthe tired bodies and cramped souls of working\\nmen Whether they knew it or not^ some-\\nthin o of the fervor of the meridian sunshine,\\nsomething of the earnestness of the mid-day\\nnature, something of the fulness of the mid-\\nyear harvest went into them, through their\\nsenses, and bore fruit in thankfulness and\\npatience. Something of the narrowness of\\ntheir ordinary lives went out of them un-\\nawares.\\nThe nooning over, bustle again prevailed.\\nThere was no faltering, no let up, until the\\nhorn gave notice of the evening meal. Then,\\nthrough lanes and highway, fields let out their\\nworkers, who cheered their homeward way\\nwith simple talk. They went over the day s\\nlabors forecasted the sky, and planned the\\ntoils of the morrow prone all to the rest of\\nthe coming night. Into the barns were shoved\\nthe ladened racks, to be emptied in the early\\nmorning down into the west sank the sun\\nover the beautiful creation of the harvest fell\\nthe older beauty of night and unto weariness,\\nand to the patience of labor, past and to come,\\nfloated, with noiseless motion, sweet, dream-\\nless, strength-giving sleep.", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0078.jp2"}, "79": {"fulltext": "CHAPTER y.\\nTHE VISIT.\\nWe were would-be haymakers, Benny and\\nI, jogging- along with Jonathan the man-ser-\\nvant, in an old market-wagon, towards our\\ngrandfather s farm. As remembered, we made\\na homely load, but a happj^ one. We were\\nhalf wild with joy, and chattered like magpies\\nall the way about our promised delights.\\nThe whole universe was ours that day. We\\nwere not simply wayfarers to our grandfather s\\nfarm, but travellers at large; and the narrow\\ncircle of the horizon seemed as vast to us as\\nthe belt of the whole continent would now.\\nWe felt well; and if, in passing, travellers\\neyed us sharply, we were sure that they knew\\nus for young haymakers. It never occurred to\\nus that our equipage was unusual. The only\\nfault we found was with the slowness of our\\npace and the jolting of the springless wagon\\nbut the one gave our quick eyes a chance to\\nspy out way-side wonders, and the other sent\\nthe blood into our cheeks. I am quite sure\\nthat we had a better time than we should have\\n6 73", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0079.jp2"}, "80": {"fulltext": "74 NEW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nhad with my grandfather s pretentious chaise\\nand one of his smarter horses.\\nI can see now the yellow lilies we counted\\namong the pines that day. I have loved yellow\\nlilies ever since. They were cheerful things to\\na child s eye, gleaming out from an old forest.\\nThey were almost as pretty alongside the front\\ndoor-steps of unpainted country-houses, where\\nthey paled somewhat, multiplied, and grew in\\nclumps; whereas in the forest each blossom\\nstood by itself in flaunting brightness, and\\nseemed to come out of the wood to meet you.\\nThe country through which we passed on\\nour journey was sparsely settled, and mostly\\ncovered with a thin forest of old pines. This\\nforest was full of a shaggy undergrowth of\\nscrub-oaks and knolls of low huckleberrv-\\nbushes. The day was hot, and everything\\n0^1 owed with sunlio^ht. In vain we turned\\nour umbrella this way and that. Its Avhale-\\nbones creaked the sun s rays pierced straight\\nthrough it, past our straw hats, into our little\\nbrains and we settled down, only to have our\\nshoulders half baked by the high wagon-back.\\nThe sand of the road-side glittered the wheel-\\ntires sank into it and came up hot and bright.\\nEach stone was a reflecting mirror, and the\\nbusiness of every leaf and twig seemed to be\\nto absorb and send forth heat. The quiet was", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0080.jp2"}, "81": {"fulltext": "THE VISIT. 75\\nSO perfect that the slightest crackle of a twig\\nwas distinctly heard. Yet, underlying this\\nglare and seeming silence was a certain posi-\\ntive procession of sound.\\nWe shut our eyes from sheer weariness,\\nand w^ere lulled to sleep by this soft drone of\\nliving, growing, ever-renewing nature. You\\ncountry-livers know what this voice is, which\\nhas no alphabet, no written language, but\\nwhich is nevertheless an all-pervading, thrill-\\ning monotone, best rendered in what are called\\nher solitudes. Benny said he could hear things\\ngrow and surely the wise little head both saw\\nand heard many beautiful things that day.\\nSo we young haymakers were not ashamed\\nof the springless, rattling old market-wagon.\\nE either were we ashamed of Jonathan, with\\nhis homespun clothes and leathern whip, chew-\\ning his cud like an ox, and shouting to his horse\\nwith a never-ending git ap. This horse was\\nnot a fine-looking beast. She was a true farm-\\nhorse, broad-backed and round-sided, carry-\\ning her head low, with a shaggy mane. She\\nwas old and not ambitious, pacing along, at\\nthe rate of five miles an hour, with a lumber-\\ning gait which gave a double jolt to the clumsy\\nwagon. She was, however, to be respected\\nfor her age and her safety and, known by the\\nname of Betsy, had been for almost thirty", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0081.jp2"}, "82": {"fulltext": "76 ^EW ENGL AND BYG ONES.\\nyears carefally tended by the family of whicli\\nshe was a true member. E ew England farm-\\ners were all merciful to their beasts of burden,\\nand this kindness was a natural expression of\\nthe ingrained justice of their natures.\\nBut one horse in the neio-hborhood was older\\nthan this one of my grandfather s, and that\\nbelonged to the aged minister of the parish.\\nHis horse, roaming at large, was as much a\\nfeature of the village landscape as its meeting-\\nhouse or its school-house. It grew into the\\nhistory and the traditions of the place. It was\\nan unaggressive, harmless animal, and came\\nto hold a sort of feeble kinship with all the\\nvillagers. When an absentee asked after the\\ntownspeople and their affairs, he also asked\\nafter the parson s horse and thus the unwit-\\nting beast came to be a representative of an\\nenlarged humanit3\\\\ This horse, long toothless\\nand fed upon porridge, was so defiant of mor-\\ntality that, out of sheer compassion, it was\\nslain at last outside the village. I verily be-\\nlieve that the young men and maidens of the\\nparish who had grown up during the lifetime\\nof this dumb creature, and were used to the\\nconstant sight of it by the way-side, mourned\\nthe loss of the parson s horse with almost a\\nsentiment of human friendship.\\nThe Betsy of my grandfather s must have", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0082.jp2"}, "83": {"fulltext": "THE VISIT. 77\\ncome of hardy stock, for she, too, outlived for\\nseveral years her usefulness, and wandered\\nduring the summer, a hobbling, gray pensioner,\\nupon the shore of the mill-pond, where one\\nday she was found stark and stiff, close by\\nthe old boat. She used, when past service, to\\nlimp up to the pasture-bars and lean her old\\nhead upon the upper rail, giving us children\\na sort of blear-eyed recognition which w^as\\nquite touching. To see this head bobbing up\\nand down amongst the far-off alder-bushes\\nwas ^as pathetic to our child-hearts as if the\\npoor creature could have talked and reasoned\\nwdth us. We were glad wdien she gave up\\nthe ghost in a natural way, for my grandfather\\ncould not consent to have her killed.\\nBenny and I did not after all make a very\\nmean appearance on our first visit alone to\\nour grandfather s farm. We w^ere only two\\nuntaught children going to a haying. Our\\nequipage and our dress w^ere suited to our\\ncalling. We were bent on a kindly errand,\\nwe were to carry youth and cheerfulness,\\nand so joy, into the great lonely house of an\\nold man. Being imaginative children, and\\nhaving little book learning, that which we\\ndesired to believe, and which fact failed to\\ngive us, we coined out of our own brains.\\nThe seven-mile sandy plain, with its pines", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0083.jp2"}, "84": {"fulltext": "78 ^^W ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nand dwarf-oaks, we declared to be no less\\nthan forty miles long; whilst a moderate-sized\\npond Benny confidently whispered behind\\nJonathan s back could be no other than the\\nDead Sea itself. Yet this simple-hearted\\nBenny was over-wise for his years about\\neverything which could be coaxed by search\\nand observation from the outlying landscape\\nof his home, and he was, besides, a charming\\nyoung romancer. It is delightful to go back\\nto one s days of just such fresh-hearted credu-\\nlity. Some of our childhood faiths may have\\nbeen very foolish indeed, but many of them\\nwere beautiful, and we are tender of them all in\\nmiemory in after-years. We can aiford to lose\\nnone of them, for these same foolish beliefs\\nwere wise to us once, and swelled the sum of\\nour earthly joys.\\nIn my grandfather s time, when railroads\\nhad not permeated Eastern New England, a\\nlong journey was an epoch in a child s life;\\nand that was called such which was accom-\\nplished by several days of slow-paced travel.\\nIt was made a subject for private devotion and\\npublic prayer. Our brother and sister about\\nto go on a long journey became marked people\\nin the parish. Neighbors dropped in of\\nevenings to talk the matter over and it was\\ndreamed about and wrought for many weeks", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0084.jp2"}, "85": {"fulltext": "THE VISIT. 79\\nbeforehand. The finest fabrics of the house\\nwere set aside and shaped over for that child\\nwho was going to Boston, or perhaps to some\\nnearer town to whom most likely was* given\\nespecial and lighter tasks, as one upon whom\\nthe unction of travel had already fallen. The\\nnight before the start was a busy one in the\\nfarm-house. Many last stitches were to be\\ntaken, and the bandbox or small trunk to be\\npacked by the careful mother. The child s\\nwardrobe, made for the occasion, was meagre,\\nbut clean and strong. It was the best the\\nfarm had to give, and was fine to the wearer.\\nI can see Farmer Brown starting off with\\nhis daughter Sally, bound for Boston, just as\\nhe started over forty years ago. He was a\\nwell-to-do farmer, homely, but shrewd and\\nhonest, and had held high places of town trust.\\nHow exactly he is recalled His broad collar\\nseems to cut his ears with its sharp edges, and\\nhis stock clasps his neck like a vice. His blue-\\nblack homespun suit has been long made, but\\nwell kept, and its showy buttons are of double\\ngilt. Sally s frock is of store calico, with a\\nwhite rufiie in the neck. The shawl she wears,\\nof some printed pongee stuff, is a family heir-\\nloom, which her grandmother wore before her.\\nHer bonnet, too gay and too small for her, has\\njust come from Boston, a gift from her seldom-", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0085.jp2"}, "86": {"fulltext": "80 ^Vi ir ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nseen uncle, who now and then thrusts a town\\ngaud upon this neglected country relative.\\nThe family of this uncle they are going to\\nvisit. The innocent souls have not waited for\\nan invitation. With them the instinct of kin-\\nship is as strong as their faith in their religion.\\nFor six months the mother s busy brain and\\nfingers have toiled over fine twined threads of\\nwheel and loom, to weave for this young girl\\nan outfit suitable for this great occasion. She\\nis a blithesome lass, just grown up, and is en-\\ngaged to teach the village school.\\nThey climb into the lumbering wagon. The\\nyounger children swarm about them, whilst\\nthe dear mother stands in the doorway with\\nbared arms, shading her eyes with her hand,\\nand watches them until they are gone out of\\nsight under the hill. Sally is the envy of\\nall the other village girls, and mothers gossip\\ntogether of this weighty journey of hers.\\nMany an aged country-reared person knoAvs\\nwhat that journey was to Sally; how grand\\nand mysterious the town seemed to her, with\\nits many streets, its crowds of people, its\\nvarious wares, and its many lights how, im-\\npressed and oppressed by it, she grew self-\\nconscious and lonely, and wished herself home\\nao:ain. Her uncle s house was an enchanted\\npalace to her, and she a dazed girl in it. It", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0086.jp2"}, "87": {"fulltext": "THE VISIT. 81\\nwas revealed to her that what pertained ,to\\nherself and to her father was not in keeping\\nwith her surroundings. They were plainly-\\ndressed, homespun country-people, well clad\\nalongside the deep greens and russet hrowns\\nof their farm, but ill assorting with gay town\\nfashions. She saw and took in much. Her\\nkeen senses and bright mind were quick-\\nened to a wider scope by this somewhat un-\\npalatable taste of strange living. The day of\\nher departure was a relief to her. She went\\nback as she came, except that she was lightly\\nladen with simple purchases. She was as\\nwarmly welcomed as if she had come from a\\nforeign land. The trinkets she had bouo;ht\\nwere as marvellous to her mother and the other\\nchildren as they would have been to her once.\\nShe somewhat pitied their ignorance, but kept\\nher own counsel. She was wiser than before\\nshe went, but not quite so happy. A glory\\nhad gone out of her home which could never\\ncome back. Its rooms were lower and nar-\\nrower; and their fitness had been lost from\\nthe garments which had been fashioned for\\nher with so much care. Their textures and\\ndyes were homespun, and so less esteemed.\\nShe made a better teacher for havins: been\\nto Boston, because she had more weisrht with\\nher scholars. But the sweetest relish of her", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0087.jp2"}, "88": {"fulltext": "82 -V^I^ ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nrural home had died out for her. In later\\nyears it came again, as a delightful memory.\\nShe would then have given half she possessed\\nto have been starting once more from the old\\nfarm-house, a simple-hearted girl in calico by\\nthe side of the homespun father, with the\\ndear mother watching her from the doorway.\\nOur old horse plodded along so wearily that\\nthe shadows had grown long on the neigh-\\nboring hills, and cow-bells were tinkling at\\nthe pasture-bars, when we drove through\\nthe gateway at the end of the green lane.\\nFar away we had caught sight of our grand-\\nfather standino in his door. We knew him\\nby his gray hair tossed in the wind. He s\\nan old dear, whispered Benny; just a little\\ncross sometimes, but never cross to me. I^o,\\nhe was never cross to little Benny, and seldom\\nto any other child. He was a most orderly\\nman, and was apt to lose patience when chil-\\ndren upset his settled ways. He never was\\nknown to scold Benny, for the boy was his\\nnamesake, and had about him, he used to\\nsay, the look of those who die young. There\\nwas an unusual trembling of the aged hand\\nwhich patted our heads, and a very tender\\ngreeting of the old man to us. Then he held\\nus at arms length, saying, with a merry tw^inkle\\nin his eye, So you young rascals have come", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0088.jp2"}, "89": {"fulltext": "THE VISIT. 83\\nto haying, have you Well, I must say, your\\nmother needn t have rigged you out like two\\nArabs; still, I think you ll do. Happy little\\nBenny thought he was praising our looks, and\\ntold me shortly that Arabs must be some grand\\npeople.\\nMy grandfather was a keen-witted, resolute,\\nhandsome man of good English stock. His\\nlife was as methodical as clock-work. His\\nthrift wrested a competence from the soil;\\nbut his best legacy to his descendants was a\\ncertain inborn freedom of soul. He loved\\nevery inch of his farm, not as a plougher and\\nplodder, but as an observer and thinker. So\\npositive and self-asserting was this high type\\nof his manhood that his only son, when ex-\\nceptionally well educated and of exalted rank\\nin his profession, never seemed more than his\\nequal. Having lived past his fourscore years,\\nhe ended his prosperous and reputable life by\\na death of serene dignity.\\nHe was called stern by his fellow-townsmen;\\nbut no man or woman ever questioned his in-\\ntegrity. His career, considering the possibili-\\nties of his nature, was a narrow one, but of\\nthe best, so far as it went. It had little gilt\\nand polish, not enough of recreation, ^but\\nsuch as it was, he took it up patiently and\\nfaithfully, and got out of it whatever of good", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0089.jp2"}, "90": {"fulltext": "84 ^^^W ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nit had in it. He did Avitli all his might what-\\never he had to do, which was so much that it\\ncrowded his life to the vers^e of servitude.\\nHe was serious and earnest, if not stern, be-\\ncause the demands of his lot left little room\\nfor lighter moods, so that a higher sense of\\njustice and humanity was born of this half-\\ntragic element of his condition.\\nThe children of such fathers were well-\\ntrained children. The parent s will was law\\nwith them, and the law of the parent was the\\nword of God. These unpetted yet deeply-loved\\nsons and daughters were truthful and honest.\\nThey were respecters of age, keepers of the\\nSabbath, and clean in all their ways, because\\ntheir home tuition had been founded upon the\\nhighest principles of religion and morality.\\nTears and tender words did not come easilv to\\nsuch hard workers and simple livers. They\\nhad an element of heroic resistance to what\\nthey considered weakness, and a Spartan esti-\\nmation of all tokens of it. Mothers could lay\\nout their dead children for burial, and fathers\\ncould look upon them with tearless eyes.\\nThe}- would put them in graves close to their\\nhomes, and then go back to their old grooves,\\ngiving little outward sign. But the hurt was\\nthere, deep and for all time. These massive\\nold heroes, these truthful, earnest wrestlers", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0090.jp2"}, "91": {"fulltext": "THE VISIT. 85\\nfor duty, held tlieir reticence as a comely in-\\nstinct, a sacred inner life.\\nThe Christian New Englander of forty years\\nago was most reverent. His children were\\nGod s trust to him as such he trained them,\\nand as such he gave them up. If he unwisely\\ncrucified the tastes and desires of his sons and\\ndaughters, it was because of his own blind\\nzeal and an overstraining of Bible precepts.\\nIf any of them, in morality, fell short of the\\nhome standard, he was more smitten by it than\\nhe would have been by their death.\\nAfter a supper of bread and milk, Benny\\nand I were sent to bed, with orders to be up\\nbright and early for the haying. The sun was\\nalready making great red streaks across the\\nchecked hangings in the east chamber when\\nBenny s tap at my door, and the patter of his\\nlittle feet across the sanded floor, startled me\\nfrom an uneasv slumber. I had been dream-\\ning of the enclosure in the mowing-field. I\\nthought we were gathering buttercups on\\nOlly s grave, when a great pit suddenly\\nyawned, and Benny fell into it. Quicb,\\nwe are almost ready, he shouted, and then\\nran away, to help fix off, he said. He had\\npumped a basin of fresh water, which, with a\\nclean towel, awaited me on the wooden bench\\nat the back-door. I scrubbed my face and", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0091.jp2"}, "92": {"fulltext": "86 NEW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nhands with zest in that tin basin, and would\\nbe willing to-day to taste, in the same homely\\nway, the pleasant abandon of that summer\\nmorning, if with it would come back the\\nscents and voices, the glowing light, and the\\nsimple occupations of its long-past, happy day.\\nWe ate no breakfast, Benny and I, we were\\ntoo happy for that; besides, a huge basket\\nunder Jonathan s arm was, Hannah whis-\\npered, brimful of goodies. The leathern-\\nhandled keg puzzled us but Benny was a\\nphilosopher, and, pointing to the flies swarm-\\ning about its spigot, confidently declared that\\nit held some savory drink.\\nThe smallest rakes were laid aside for the\\nnew hands, as our grandfather jocosely called\\nus, and we were left to follow after the loads.\\nOur little fists grew red and speckled but\\nBenny said they would soon be tough like\\nJonathan s, and the fun of treading down\\nthe sweet hay and jolting over the sill of the\\nbarn more than made up for all our ills. Our\\nnew hands ain t so green after all, remarked\\nspruce David to his fellow-mower. Tell\\nbetter arter the new s ofi: was Jonathan s bluft\\nreply. Tlie old clown whispered Benny.\\nHow clever David is said I.\\nBy and by, when the sun had gotten into\\nthe zenith, we began to feel hot and tired, and", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0092.jp2"}, "93": {"fulltext": "THE VISIT. 87\\ncast longing glances towards the shady rock\\nby the spring, behind which were the keg and\\nbundle. My grandfather, seeing us lag, took\\npity upon us, and sent us there to rest. We\\nate our share of the lunch, and took Ions*\\ndraughts of sweetened water from the keg.\\nBenny thought there was too much ginger in\\nit, but drank freely. Alas for the struggling\\nfly which, sticking fast upon Benny s nose,\\ndaubed over with molasses, made us fora*et to\\nput back the spigot. When the thirsty mowers\\ncame round the rock the keg was empty,\\nSo much for babies in haying -time,\\ngrowled Jonathan. My grandfather looked\\nsevere, and told us to start for the house.\\nSo we did, David slipping round the rock to\\nsay to us that it was no matter, for he would\\nfill the keg again.\\nWe idled the afternoon sadly away in the\\nold farm-house. True to human nature, Ave\\nlittle ones turned against each other. You\\nare black as a crow, said Benny. And\\nyou, retorted I, are as speckled as an ad-\\nder. All from this hateful haying, Benny\\nwent on. Then, common grief making com-\\nmon cause, we came together again; and,\\npledging everlasting absence from the haying\\nfield, we dwelt in love and harmonv until bed-\\ntime. Somehow my tired little body would", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0093.jp2"}, "94": {"fulltext": "88 ^EW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nnot rest that night. I had another frightful\\ndream about a deep pit and little Benny. I\\nkept waking up but the bed-curtains looked\\nso black, and the dimly-seen windows so\\nghostly, that I shut my eyes and lay trembling\\nwith fear half the night. It was very late the\\nnext morning when I was awakened by the\\nmerry haymakers under my window, on their\\nway to the mowing-field. Above every other\\nvoice rang out Benny s, glad and care free.\\nAfter that the haying -time passed away\\nquickly and merrily. Best of holidays to me\\nfrom which have come some of the brightest\\npictures and purest sentiments of my life. Pay-\\nday came. Jonathan and David received their\\nwell-earned wages scores of transient helpers\\nhad come and gone Benny and I each clasped\\nin our brown hands four bright silver dollars.\\nThe big gate opened to let out the market-\\nwagon, with two joyous-hearted children.\\nTheir clothes were much the worse for wear,\\nand they looked even queerer than they did\\nwhen they came. They turned tenderly back\\nto the white-haired old man, who watched\\nthem from the porch-door. I ll come again\\nvery soon, called Benny. He did come, and\\nthe big gate opened wide to let him in.", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0094.jp2"}, "95": {"fulltext": "CHAPTER YI.\\nLITTLE BENNY.\\nThe summer liarvest was past, but not tlie\\nremembrance of it. Benny and I were ever\\ncounting the months, and then the weeks,\\nbefore another haying. We spent our holi-\\ndays in the making of miniature rakes, and\\nwere o:arrulous the whole winter with our\\nsimple memories, ^o story-book couhl give\\nus pleasure like going over the past summer s\\nhomely life. We talked much of little things\\nof the maimed lamb that limped at our call to\\nhis evening meal; the speckled trout in the\\ndeep old well the play rock the herds the\\napple-trees; and much, very much, of the\\ndear, trembling old man, who never seemed\\nold to us, over whom the unreasoning love\\nof childhood cast the glamour of immortal\\nyouth.\\nThere was to be a jubilee, in anticipation\\nof which I had exchanged my grandfather s\\ndollars for bright ribbons, whilst Benny s had\\ngone into the price of a pair of fine gaiters.\\nThe long-wished-for morning came. Benny s\\n7 89", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0095.jp2"}, "96": {"fulltext": "90 ^EW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nlittle jacket, with a white collar pinned to its\\nneck, hung from a nail in the wall his new\\ngaiters stood upon the mantel. Bennj could\\nnot wear them then. I entered into the sports\\nof that day with all the buoyancy of child-\\nhood; and though I heard Benny s moans as\\nI passed the half-opened door, I did not think\\nat evening to bid him good-night or give him\\nhis wonted kiss. Giddy girl That same\\nsick Benny was the gay companion of haying-\\ntime.\\nEver thus selfish is J03\\\\ What sympathy\\ncan gladness have with sorrow If death has\\nnever entered your own household, you can\\ncarry little consolation to the mourner, ^your\\nwords will be as sounding brass and tinkling\\ncymbals. Days passed away long, weary days.\\nThe gaiters still kept their place on the mantel\\nthe white collar had become yellow with smoke\\nand dust, but still it stayed. Benny no longer\\nasked about the jubilee, and T shrank from his\\ndarkened room. How anxiously I watched\\nthe doctor s face as he softly emerged from the\\nsick-chamber How my little heart beat if\\never its wonted benis-nant smile returned\\nOne morning (Benny had been ill two\\nweeks) I w^as awakened by the rumbling of\\na vehicle. There was no mistaking the sound;\\nit was the old market-wagon. In a few min-", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0096.jp2"}, "97": {"fulltext": "LITTLE BENNY. 91\\nutes I was by my grandfather s side. There\\nwas no tremulous grasp of the hand, no gentle\\ngreeting, no fond pat on the head. His\\nthoughts were with Benny, his namesake.\\nTread softly, whispered the doctor, as I\\nled my grandfather to the side of the sick-\\nbed. He leaned heavily on his staff, and a\\ntear trickled down his furrowed cheek.\\nBenny will not help us hay another year,\\nsaid the old man to me, in broken tones. How\\nthat death-knell fell on my soul Was Benny,\\nthe good, the beautiful Benny, to die and be\\nburied in the cold, damp earth It could not\\nbe; and yet, as I looked at him the terrible\\nconviction forced itself upon me. His little\\nbrown hands had become thin and white, his\\ncheeks sunken. He opened his eyes.\\nBenny, do you know me asked grand-\\nfather, fondly.\\nHe murmured incoherently something about\\nhaying-time, the big rock, and the mowing-\\nfield. Again my grandfather dropped a tear.\\nIt was more than my childish heart could\\nbear. I ran to my chamber, and throwing\\nmyself upon the bed yielded to the first sharp\\nagony of life. Oh, it is a fearful thing to pass\\nfor the first time through the gates of sorrow\\nIt was dark, very dark, when I was awakened\\nby a light tap upon my shoulder. I knew the", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0097.jp2"}, "98": {"fulltext": "92 ^EW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\ntouch; it was my grandfather s hand. I asked\\nno questions, but followed him instinctively to\\nthe sick-room. I knew that Benny, my loved\\nBenny, was dying.\\nThere was no shrinking from the mysterious\\nthreshold. In the agony of that moment I\\ncould not cry, but stood by the side of the\\ndear boy as cold, calm, and still almost as\\nhimself. There was no look of recognition\\nno word from the palsied tongue. One gasp,\\none quiver of the thin lip, and the fragile\\nchord which bound his pure soul to earth\\nwas broken, there was no longer in that\\nhousehold a little Benny. It was a most\\nsolemn death-room. A mother wept for her\\nlost one, and refused to be comforted a father\\nwas bowed in agony for the child of his heart\\nand, more touching still, the silvered locks of\\ndecrepit age mingled with the golden curls of\\nlifeless childhood.\\nThus it is the child sports a brief hour;\\nmanhood leagues with mammon a few sliort\\nyears and only here and there is given a long\\nlife.\\nRummao:ino^ not lon^: since anion o;st some\\nold letters, I came upon one directed in faded\\nink to my grandfather. It could hardly be\\ndeciphered, so worn and discolored was it by\\ntime. It was a summons to Benny s bed-", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0098.jp2"}, "99": {"fulltext": "LITTLE BENNY. 93\\nside. At the bottom of the page, in an old\\nman s tremulous hand, was this postscript\\nBenny died of brain fever the next day, at\\nten of the clock p.m. He was my best beloved\\ngrandchild.\\nFor weeks I mourned for my lost play-\\nmate. His chair kept its place in the corner\\nthe miniature rakes were fondly cherished;\\nthe collar was still unpinned. By chance one\\nday the chair was moved; anon the rusty\\npin was drawn from the jacket, and one by\\none the little rakes disappeared. The next\\nhaying-time found me almost as blithe and\\ngay as ever. Thus evanescent are the griefs\\nof early childhood.\\nLittle Benny was buried on the old farm.\\nIt was my grandfather s wish that he should be.\\nPeople came from far and near to his funeral.\\nThey made a quaint throng, hard-faced men\\nand women, serious and sympathetic, and\\nyoung men and maidens, with a curious awe\\nat this, in the country, unusual presentment\\nof the sublime beauty of a dead child. All\\nalong the farm-yard fence, as far as to the\\nfarther gate, stood the homely teams of these\\npeople, who had left their tasks to show their\\nrespect and sympathy for their neighbor. This\\ncongregating of wagons about a country house\\nwas a sure token of woe, more sio-nificant and", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0099.jp2"}, "100": {"fulltext": "94 NEW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\ntoucliing than any bands of crape so also was\\nthe decorous going in and out of the silent\\nthrong. Seen from a distance, they made a\\nsolemn pageant contrasted with the usual\\nquiet of a country home.\\nBenny lay in his coffin between the Avindows\\nof the fore room, that room which was\\nnever used save for some memorial purpose.\\nIts doors and windows were flung wide open\\nnow, and the bright sunshine streamed athwart\\nthe child s face and kindled it into a marvel-\\nlous life likeness. He had few flowers about\\nhim but from the garden and the fields out-\\nside came the scent of blossoms he had loved,\\nand sweet-smelling things were clasped in\\nthe hands of the women. He seemed not to\\nbe dead, but asleep and most tenderly did\\nnature caress this clay image of her child-\\nlover with her best summer gifts. The\\nmourners, with their dearest friends, sat about\\nthe boy, thus holding fast to him to the hast.\\nThe preacher stood upon the threshold of\\nthe fore room, talking mostly to them, and\\npraying for them with a painful personality.\\nHe did not, however, forget the application of\\nhis text and the lesson of the day to the peo-\\nple in the other rooms. His voice pervaded\\nevery corner of the house, and the breeze\\ncaught it up and carried it to the traveller", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0100.jp2"}, "101": {"fulltext": "LITTLE BENNY. 95\\non the highway, a solemn sound. When he\\nhad finished Farmer Brown, in his homely way,\\nbut with a voice tender with sorrow, said,\\nThe mourners can now look at the child.\\nDid you ever respond to such a call\\nWhat measure is there to the agony of this\\nlast silent interview with the unresponsive\\ndead; this unanswered greeting of one who,\\nfor time, is lost in the most irrevocable sense\\nthis unheeded letting-out of the afi:ections to\\nwhat is already going back to dust\\nNext to the mourners, the neighbors were\\ninvited to take a last look at the departed.\\nKeenly, as if it were but yesterday, do I re-\\nmember the sweet speech of this unpolished\\nman the instinctive shrinking of this tender-\\nhearted rustic from thrusting a cruel fact upon\\nthose wdiom it most concerned. The relatives\\nwere asked to look upon their child as upon\\none wdio slept the neighbors, for the last time,\\nupon the dead. They all men, women, and\\nchildren took their turn over the little cofiin.\\nThey were greatly moved, even the hardest\\nfeatured of them. Men drew their horny\\nhands over their eyes, and women sobbed\\naloud over this child, whom many of them\\nhad never seen while living, but who, dead,\\nw^rought from their suppressed natures this\\nmiracle of emotion.", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0101.jp2"}, "102": {"fulltext": "96 -^^^W ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nHe lay there, his golden curls and long lashes\\nsun-gilded, and clinging to his marhle image\\nwith strange brightness. He was to them a\\nnew and beautiful revelation. He was as un-\\nlike their own children as if he had belons-ed\\nto another race. Death could not chisel the\\nbest of their own into his likeness. They\\nsaw, but could not comprehend, the rare\\nquality of this child, and so they looked upon\\nhim and wept in wonder. He was too beauti-\\nful, they said, to be put out of sight; and\\nnature seemed to rebuke them while she\\nsmiled upon all the stages of this his last\\nand little journey. The sun sank towards\\nthe west, and from beyond the woodland and\\npasture it streamed across the open grave, and\\nfilled the thing itself with a waiting glory.\\nThe child was covered and carried across the\\ngreen field, and let down into it; and in a\\nlittle while all there was left of the sad\\npageant of that summer s day was a small\\nbrown mound in si^ht of the west room\\nwindow.\\nIt seems to me, as I look back, a sweet\\nburial without dread, that carrying out of the\\nlovely child from the old farm-house, amidst\\nsunshine and tender mourning, and laying\\nhim down in the green field which he had\\nmade jocund the summer before with his de-", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0102.jp2"}, "103": {"fulltext": "LITTLE BENNY. 97\\nlight. We talked of this boy as having been\\ncut off, but after all his little life had been\\nfull and complete and well rounded and when\\nhis short journey had come to an end, the sun-\\nshine which he had brought with him flooded\\nand followed him. His burial on it glorified\\nthe farm. He was always there, not as under\\nthe mound with its lettered stone, but as a\\ntrue little Benny, who, unresponsive to touch\\nor speech, did yet roam about the place. He\\nhas never grown old, but has grown grand\\nwith years. Tlie capacity of this child has been\\nperfected by loving memory to the measure of\\nthe whole universe. He roams at Lars^e. I shall\\nnever know him here again, by sight or speech\\nor touch, but one day we shall, I trust, know\\neach other, not as we were, but as we are to be.\\nThus the watchers and waiters, whose going\\naway from us tore our hearts, are to take the\\nsting of death from us. They compelled us\\nto shut them out of our earthly homes that\\nthey might welcome us into a heavenly. Dear\\nchildren, you of earlier and you of later days,\\nhow will the mystery of your brief lives be un-\\nravelled when you shall come down resplen-\\ndent to the shore of the shining river, that you\\nmay help over the old, the infirm, and the\\nweary, who stayed behind and mourned for\\nyou", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0103.jp2"}, "104": {"fulltext": "CHAPTER VII.\\nTHE BURIAL-PLACE.\\nMy granclfixther s burial-place was witliin a\\nstone s throw of the west room windows. To\\none coming from north or south, east or west,\\nit was as conspicuous as the house itself. Its\\ntablets were the ghosts of my childhood. They\\ngave me many terrified waking hours, taking\\nshape and motion to me as I stared at them\\nfrom my chamber window. These family\\ngraveyards were a peculiar feature of the\\ncountry. They gave pathos to a landscape,\\nrecording with tragic fidelity the sorrows and\\nmortality of its inhabitants. My grandfather\\nloved his burial-place. It was in the way of a\\nstraight path to the orchard and the mowing-\\nfield, but he seemed glad to be turned aside\\nby it. No spot, he said, was too good for little\\nBenny. He used to sit hour after hour at the\\nwindow which overlooked it, the wind softly\\nlifting his silvery hair, while he silently con-\\ntemplated this smallest, but most precious, of\\nall his fields. What was he thinking about\\nwhat memories touched him what certainties\\n98", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0104.jp2"}, "105": {"fulltext": "THE BURTAL-PLACE. 99\\nawed him Watching with the keen eye of\\nchiklhoocl I got no sign, for the spiritual life\\nof this reticent old man was chary of utter-\\nance. He knew that in this bed he should\\nsome day be laid at rest and the more trem-\\nbling his old limbs grew, the nearer his feet\\napproached the borders of the silent land, the\\nmore he used to sit and gaze at his graves, and\\nponder, without doubt, upon the mysteries of\\nthe hereafter.\\nThese little fields were family heirlooms.\\nE o one could be so pinched by poverty, or so\\ndepraved in sentiment, as willingly to sell\\nthem. When farms changed owners, these\\nwere carefully exempted and fenced in. Oc-\\ncasionally circumstance so far removed, or\\nProvidence so blotted out, a posterity, that a\\ngrave became ownerless. Even then humanity\\nkept it from hard usage. No question of util-\\nity could uproot from the sod the claim upon\\nit of its first occupants. It was kept by their\\nmemory as firmly as when they held in living\\nhands its written title-deeds. There comes\\nespecially to mind such a burial-place. It was\\nupon a hillock in the corner of a field, at the\\nend of a green lane a lovely spot overlooking\\na wide stretch of country. A sweet apple-\\ntree, always in summer full of fruit, overhung\\nit. I see the uneven mound now, matted with", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0105.jp2"}, "106": {"fulltext": "100 ^EW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\ngrass, strewn with golden apples, and only\\ntelling by tradition of tlie presence of the\\ndead. I remember how stealthily children\\nclimbed up the wall and snatched at over-\\nhanging boughs. They were shy of the wind-\\nfalls on the other side, for these lonely graves\\nwere to fields what ghosts are to haunted\\nchambers.\\nMy grandfather s old farm-house, with its\\nlands, may go to strangers but the little field,\\nfirst made precious to me by Benny s burial,\\nshall remain undesecrated. Under every\\nchancre of life I know that it will be to me\\no\\nand my children a hallowed possession. Its\\nmounds, whose tenants have gone back to the\\ndust from whence they came, have given place\\nto hollows full of rank grass and ^^arrow. Its\\nslabs of perishable slate are seamed and fretted\\nby the wear and tear of many years. Its\\ntumbled wall is covered with raspberry-vines\\nand sumachs, and a maple-tree has grown\\nmonumental with the years which have eaten\\naway the inscriptions from the stones beneath\\nit. E ot long since I visited the spot. I plucked\\na blossom from a strawberry-vine which had\\nthrown its tendrils into an old grave, and\\nlooked upon the uneven earth about me.\\nBenny s little stone reproached me with its\\nforty odd years of wear. I grew sorrowful.", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0106.jp2"}, "107": {"fulltext": "THE BURIAL-PLACE. 101\\nThen from the luxuriant outgrowth around\\nme came the assurance of hope in death;\\nevery crevice of the crumhling stones was\\nteemins: with veo-etation. Growth had heen\\nborn of decay from death had sprung beau-\\ntiful life. The sod itself had been ripened by\\ngiving back to it its rightful dust. Why then\\nshould one mourn when a spirit, let loose\\nfrom its bonds, exchanges its kinship with\\nsin and sorrow and pain for a glorious im-\\nmortality\\nSacred to the memory of the dead This\\nis the most common legend, and also the truest\\nand best. There is no being so mean that he\\nmay not claim for himself this epitaph. The\\ngrave is common ground. So far as this\\nworld goes, it brings all to the same level.\\nThe beggar is as sure of his morsel of earth\\nas the prince is of his tomb. The rankness of\\nthe one is as eloquent as the pomp of the other.\\nThe prince was clothed in purple and fine\\nlinen, and the damp mould clasped him the\\nbeggar was clad in rags, and the busy grass\\nwove for him a rentless covering.\\nThe world is full of unknown graves, of\\nwhose tenants she tells no stories the un-\\nmarked and uncared-for graves of people\\nstranded by accident or circumstance of\\nslaughtered soldiers of pioneers in new conn-", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0107.jp2"}, "108": {"fulltext": "102 ^^EW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\ntries of martyrs to liberty of travellers in\\nfar lands. The sea is continually dragging\\ninto its hungry maw human life, which it ab-\\nsorbs and hides as relentlessly as it washes\\naway the sands of its shore. There is an un-\\nutterable pathos in nameless graves. I have\\nwalked through acres strewn thick with sol-\\ndiers bones, the harvest of great battles, ^o\\ninscription has touched me like the simple\\nunknown which breaks the monotony of\\ntheir epitaphs. It tells that there lies a man,\\nno matter how long and well he has fought for\\nhis country, who was so undowered by for-\\ntune, so smitten by circumstance, that even his\\nname has been lost! Yet no grave can be\\nnaked and forsaken, for trees and shrubs and\\ngrasses and flowers will grow on it, and over\\nit spans the grand arch of heaven.\\nIn the pioneer days of I^ew England the\\nchurchyard was a favorite burial-place. The\\nearly settlers, beset by Indians, generally\\nplanted their meeting-houses upon hill-tops\\nwhich overlooked the wooded country. They\\nwere thus less easily surprised, and better de-\\nfended in case of danger. These meeting-\\nhouses had watch-towers were strong with\\noaken beams and barricades and on Sun-\\nday were filled with armed worshippers. To\\nhold out unsleeping through long services was", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0108.jp2"}, "109": {"fulltext": "THE BURIAL-PLACE. 103\\nthe chief effort of many of the overworked\\nhearers. But the men, whose eyes were wide\\nopen, whose ears were quick to hear, whose\\nthoughts were clear, condensed, their post\\nwas in the towers. !N ot an unseen shadow\\npassed over the woodland; not an unheard\\ntwig broke in it; scarcely the rustle of a leaf\\nescaped them. Death, or worse, might be the\\nprice of one minute of laggard service. What\\na grand picture one of these heroic old watch-\\nmen would make, perched, defiant and faithful,\\non one of those bygone church-towers stand-\\ning there as much a w-arrior against the wild-\\nness of nature as the savageness of man.\\nGerome has painted a Mussulman calling to\\nprayers from the minaret of a mosque. The\\nturbaned old Turk, leaning from his lofty\\nperch, gives a weird beauty to this cold,\\nheathen picture. Our Christian w^atchman,\\nlifted over the desolateness of the forest and\\nthe wiles of the savage, could not help stand-\\ning out from such a foreground with a clear-\\ncut and sublime distinctness.\\nIt is curious to trace out on the highest\\npoint of some prominent New England land-\\nscape the almost hidden outlines of one of\\nthese Christian strongholds, invisible to the\\npasser-by, but positive and well-defined to the\\nantiquary. I have seen the latter coax out", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0109.jp2"}, "110": {"fulltext": "104 ^EW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nfrom a grass-grown summit the underlying\\nsods of an old structure. He paced it for me,\\nand told me where were its pulpit, its door,\\nand its towers. He rebuilt for me this quaint\\nhouse into the tamed landscape. One cannot\\nat this day well appreciate the heroism of that\\narmed devotion. It is easier to imagine how\\ndazed one of the old watchmen would be to\\nfind himself suddenly resurrected upon his\\ntower, with no foe to fight against.\\nWhen the Indians had passed away the\\nmeeting-houses were still, for convenience,\\ncentrally located and, being used by a whole\\ntownship, were often far away from any habi-\\ntation. Later, however, the isolated meeting-\\nhouse, with its God s acre, was deserted.\\nPopulation increased, villages sprang up, and\\nnew places of worship were built to meet the\\ngrowing means and needs of the people. The\\nold burial-grounds began to seem too far away\\nand too lonely for the beloved dead. Village\\npeople chose to lay them in some spot near by,\\nwhich was fenced carefully out and adorned\\nwith trees and shrubs. At the same time the\\nthrifty farmer set aside a spot in some field,\\napt to be the most conspicuous point on his\\nfarm.\\nMeanwhile the deserted plat, sown thick\\nwith the bones of Christian pioneers, was", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0110.jp2"}, "111": {"fulltext": "THE BURIAL-PLACE. 105\\ntaken up and cared for by nature. Tradition\\nclung to it, ghosts haunted it, vegetation ran\\nriot over it, its walls tumbled, its stones were\\nzigzag, it was ragged and uneven and wild,\\nbut beautiful. It lay upon the landscape a\\nlegend of the past, whether you read it in its\\nrude inscriptions or in the gray desolateness\\nof its aspect. It came to be known as the\\nold graveyard, something incorporated into\\nthe history and atmosphere of the place; a\\nsolemn suburb, in the sentiment of which\\nevery villager had an inherited or acquired\\npossession.\\nA mile away from a ^ew England village,\\non the edge of a primeval forest, by the side\\nof a deserted highway, have lain undisturbed\\nfor years the bones of its patriarchs. Here\\nwas once a meeting-house, but so long ago\\nthat nothing but tradition tells of its site.\\nThis meetino^-house doubtless had its towers\\nand its watchers; but the thing itself, and\\nthe actors in it, have literally gone back to\\ndust. Only the undying beauty of the land-\\nscape remains, which embodies in it the an-\\ncient burial-place. This is almost surrounded\\nby a pine forest, and is only separated by the\\nthread of a grass-grown path from a beautiful\\nlake. It is one of the sweetest spots I ever\\nknew and if a patch of earth can be sacred\\n8", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0111.jp2"}, "112": {"fulltext": "106 ^^W ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nto the memory of the dead, this is made so by\\nthe dedication of munificent nature. The site\\nof it, with that of the meeting-house, contrary\\nto custom in troublous times, lies low. The\\nshimmering little pond must have been de-\\nlightful to the pioneers of the unbroken wil-\\nderness. Its shores can be but little changed\\nfrom what they were in the days of the old\\nmeeting-house, for the pine-trees of its encir-\\ncling forest seem as ancient as time itself.\\nWere the pines, without undergrowth, and\\nthe pond and the highways good for strategic\\npurposes, or were the builders of this ancient\\nhouse beguiled by the exceeding beauty of\\nthe landscape? Three Indians, after a hard\\nstruggle, were once killed upon this pond,\\nand the meeting-house outlived their race\\nso I suppose the old savage drama was played\\nout in it. Long sermons were preached; guns\\nwere stacked by its doorway; and up in its\\ntowers stood men, whose eyes never turned\\naway from the road, the pond, and the pines.\\nOf all the tragic and historic life of the spot,\\nw^e have left only this forsaken burial-place.\\nKow and then a traveller, drawn by the\\nshimmering of the little pond through the\\ntrees, follows the by-road which leads to it.\\nHe stoops down, pulls apart tangled weeds\\nand grass, and tries to spell out some of its", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0112.jp2"}, "113": {"fulltext": "THE BURIAL-PLAOE. 107\\ntime-worn inscriptions. He finds the deeply-\\ncut name of the last pastor of the church, and\\nof scores of other ancient and godly men.\\nWhat he fails to decipher are manifold texts\\nof Scripture and verses of old hymns, quaintly\\nspelled and lettered. This now illegible stone-\\nscript was once tenderly illustrative of the\\nvirtues of the underlying dead. I recall, as\\nif it were but yesterday, the last burial in\\nthat old church-yard the rude bier the\\nprocession of villagers following after the\\nmourners the sunshine and the silence of\\nthe day. The train wound slowly through\\nthe forest, by the pond, into the church-yard.\\nThere was no rattling of hearse and coaches\\nno crowd of gazers in holiday attire. It was\\na carrying of the dead with simple, solemn\\nceremony to the grave. The bier was set\\ndown the villagers stood around it; and then\\nthe minister, with bared head, said, reverently,\\nLet us pray. His voice went through the\\nold wood, across the pond, and seemed to fill\\nall space.\\nI know of no service more beautiful and\\nimpressive than a village funeral of olden\\ntimes. I have been to many such, and each\\nstands out in memory like a painting. The\\nbereavement of one villager was the grief of\\nevery other. Silence and sorrow fell over", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0113.jp2"}, "114": {"fulltext": "108 ^EW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nthem all. The presence of the dead hallowed\\na house. Hard-working women crowded in,\\nand grew gentle and beautiful with sympathy.\\nBronzed men, with hands calloused by toil,\\nlifted and folded the rusty pall as lightly as if\\nit had been of gossamer. The preacher, stand-\\ning upon the threshold of the best room,\\nfilled the house with his simple words hymns\\nwere sung reverently by untrained voices;\\nrelatives took a last look of their dead; neigh-\\nbors followed after them the lid was ham-\\nmered down with that mournful stroke once\\nheard never forgotten the coarse-handed,\\nwarm-hearted men lifted the coffin as ten-\\nderly as they had handled the pall, and car-\\nried it outside where the bier waited to receive\\nit. The house was hushed as it passed out,\\nand the procession, called out by some neigh-\\nbor, noiselessly formed behind it.\\nWhat a terrible passing out that is, the\\ngoing forth of a dead body never to return\\nHope goes forth with the most forlorn de-\\nparture of a living friend. Sickness, distance,\\ntime, all leave room for desire and expecta-\\ntion death never We cannot know our\\nloss until our dead have left us. The presence\\nof the lifeless body gives us a measure of con-\\nsolation. It awes us by the symmetry of its\\nmarble beauty. The utter peace and silence", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0114.jp2"}, "115": {"fulltext": "THE BURIAL-PLACE. 109\\nwhich possess it steal also into us, and we sit\\ncomforted in the presence of our dead. But\\noh who can measure the utter agony of that\\nhour when they go from us for all time, borne\\nout unresisting, to be forevermore things of\\nthe past If we call out to them, their own lips\\nare dumb. Stretching out our arms for them,\\ntheir own are bound and move not. Turning\\nback to the desolated household, what utter\\nemptiness is there, silence and darkness and\\nnothingness where was fulness and brightness\\nand presence ^o echo of a voice in the air;\\nno footfall; never so light a touch of the\\nhand; gone, utterly gone; henceforth to be\\nslipping farther and farther away from the\\ntreacherous hold of memory.\\nAfter a funeral the people were apt to\\nlinger, dropping oiF one by one, each to his\\nown way and work; only relatives and near\\nfriends staying to sit down to unrelished\\nbaked meats. The bier, flinging out its fan-\\ntastic arms, always marked the newest-made\\ngrave, and stayed upon it until transferred to\\nthat of a later comer.\\nI have listened hours to a village necrology\\nfrom the lips of an old woman, who never\\nmissed the date of a funeral, nor forgot the\\nway the wind blew on the day of it, or the\\nmeats the mourners ate. Her tales, told mostly", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0115.jp2"}, "116": {"fulltext": "110 ^\u00c2\u00a3!W ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nin rude rhyme, were ludicrously minute, yet\\nsimple and touching. It was like the unroll-\\ning of a panorama of scenes, rough, perhaps,\\nand sharply sketched by few lines, but most\\nadmirable for truth and power. Tender tra-\\nditions, quaint old customs, you are all a part\\nof the treasures of bygone days.", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0116.jp2"}, "117": {"fulltext": "CHAPTEE YIIL\\nHANNAH AND JONATHAN.\\nThere were hired men and hired\\nwomen, but no servants, in my grandfather s\\nday. These hired men and women were\\nthe sons and daughters of respectable farmers,\\nwho had simply transferred themselves into\\nmore prosperous homes than their own. There\\nwas no degradation in the change. Hard\\nlabor was the birthright of the average farm-\\ner s boy, and he cared little whether he\\ndrudged upon his father s farm or upon that\\nof a neighbor. The girl who was neat and\\nthrifty at home made a neat and thrifty\\nhelp, and as such she had her reward in a\\ngood name and kindly treatment. Her pay\\nwas very small as wages are now reckoned,\\nbut ample for the needs of her time. Her\\ndress was suited to her calling. In winter it\\nwas of homespun woollen in summer it was\\nof strong gingham, also home-made, but far\\nprettier than the winter garment. The threads\\nof the latter, spun in long winter evenings", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0117.jp2"}, "118": {"fulltext": "112 NEW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nand dyed in the chimney-corner, made sombre,\\nunbecoming stuffs. The ginghams, fancifully\\nchecked with blue or yellow, were the product\\nof the flax-field. The rustic weaver, sitting in\\nthe sunshine on summer days, skilfully plied\\nher shuttle, and from the seeming entangle-\\nment of white threads with blue and yellow\\nand brown, rolled off from the beam of her\\nloom an admirable web. It was clean-look-\\ning and strong, and into the making of it had\\ngone some of the farm s most precious prod-\\nucts. Underlying its texture were the dainty\\nblue blossoms of the flax-bed, and skill and\\njudgment had been brought to bear upon each\\nof the many processes of its handling.\\nThe garments made from it would now seem\\nas quaint as the web itself. Hannah always\\nwore when working about the house a long,\\nbroad apron, with gathered bib, tied at the\\nneck and waist with strings. In winter this\\nwas of blue mixed cotton and wool cloth, and\\nin summer of the checked blue or yellow and\\nwhite gingham. It was an inseparable part of\\nher working attire, a true servant s costume,\\nas peculiar and becoming to her vocation as\\nthe peasant dress of any other country.\\nThis Hannah, the hired girl of my grand-\\nfather, was a representative one. Her beha-\\nvior was as befitting her station as her dress.", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0118.jp2"}, "119": {"fulltext": "HANNAH AND JONATHAN. 113\\nDespite the seeming equality of her position\\nin the household, she Avas utterly honest,\\npatient, faithful, and respectful. She never\\nchanged her place, and she spun and wove\\nand knit and stitched her strength into the\\nfabrics of the house until her hair grew gray\\nand her eyes dim in its service. Long rule\\nmade my grandmother somewhat hard, and\\nshe was liable to exact from Hannah, as a\\nright, that labor which she had first bought as\\na privilege. The lifelong serving-woman, by\\nrunning in her narrow groove year after year,\\nhad become a sort of machine, and her mistress\\nhad learned to expect the unfailing working of\\nit. The relation was not a tender one, but it was\\nhonest and respectable. In the soil of that ]N ew\\nEngland life the pan lay close to the surface.\\nSuch servants as Hannah were often sought\\nin marriage by hard-working young farmers.\\nThey made faithful, thrifty wives, and their\\nhouses were scrupulously neat. They only\\nshifted one drudgery for another, but in their\\nown humble homes pride was added to the\\npatience which they wove into the webs of\\ntheir employers.\\nThe neighbors talked of Hannah as having\\nbeen a good-looking lass, but when Benny and\\nI first knew her she was much the worse for\\nwear. Still her faded gray eyes looked kindly", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0119.jp2"}, "120": {"fulltext": "114 iV^TF ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nupon US and we loved her. l^obody seemed\\nto think that Hannah had grown old. Her\\nname and her virtues were a perennial posses-\\nsion of the house and the neighborhood. She\\nwas always called Hannah. Her dress and\\nher ways never changed. What went to make\\nup Hannah was the same through all years.\\nBy this the people knew her. The more un-\\nkindly time treated her body the more valued\\nHannah became. The serving-woman grew\\nlean and wrinkled and ugly, but Hannah\\ngrew venerable and beloved. There was about\\nher a certain magnetism which ignored station.\\nThis humble serving-woman, this Hannah\\nin her homespun tyre, filled with wild herbs\\nand roots, carried healing with her to sick\\nneighbors. She was so gentle that she was\\nmore welcome than her mistress. In that\\nhousehold into Avhich death had come Hannah\\nwas sure to be. The softness of her voice and\\ntouch and step brought consolation with them.\\nThere was something in her life that preached,\\nthat great faith which she had borne with\\nher from childhood, and which she plainly\\nshaped into simple words, that utter self-sac-\\nrifice which clothed her like a garment, and\\nput out of sight all that was homely about her.\\nThe sympathy she offered fell like balm where\\nwiser speech failed.", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0120.jp2"}, "121": {"fulltext": "HANNAH AND JONATHAN. 115\\nHannah had queer ways. She was given to\\ninterior adornments, and the fruits of her\\nneedlework were thick in the house. These\\nwere not fine, but considerins: the material\\nfrom which she wrought them, and the time\\naiid patience which she gave to them, they\\nwere worthy of praise. She pinned black\\nbroadcloth cats to the wall, brought out in\\nsilhouette upon red flannel. As portraits they\\nw^ere failures, and little Benny was always say-\\ning to her that he was sure he had never seen\\nany cats like them. She hung novel comb-\\ncases under all the bedroom looking-glasses.\\nThese w^ere of varied shapes and materials,\\nsome of broadcloth, some of straw, and less\\npretentious ones of covered pasteboard, all\\nmuch stitched with colored silks. The patch-\\nwork about the house was endless. Hannah\\nhoarded scraps of silk and cambric, and pieced\\nthem together into pin-balls, chair-cushions,\\nand coverlets. She glued painted pictures to\\nthe inside of wide-mouthed glass jars, which\\nshe filled with flour and planted with aspara-\\ngus, thus simulating quaint vases. She em-\\nbossed blown egg-shells with the pith of bul-\\nrushes, coiled round bits of bright silk, and\\nhung them upon pine boughs in the fireplaces\\nof the front rooms. Homely handiwork, but\\nwell seasoned with the true flavor of rustic life.", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0121.jp2"}, "122": {"fulltext": "116 NEW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nHer best taste she gave to her flowers. She\\nhad never read a book on flower-culture her\\nlessons had come from woodland, pasture, and\\nfield. From her earliest childhood she had\\nbeen used to blossoms, bright and sweet and\\ngrowing just where they ought to grow. Her\\nscarlet poppies set off the Southern-wood bed,\\nhop-vines hid the ragged garden-wall, and lilies\\nand rose-bushes ran riot in corners. She had\\nher bachelor s buttons and marigolds and pinks,\\nand a host of other common flowers, crowded\\nagainst beets and carrots and parsnips, wher-\\never she could get a chance for them. They\\nran parallel on both sides with the broad,\\nmiddle garden-walk, flanked the edges of side-\\nbeds, and faced their outermost paths with a\\nfringe of sweetness. Coming up two-leaved\\nand tiny, they had a hard fight against my\\ngrandfather s and Jonathan s hoes but they\\nthrove nevertheless, and ripened into the\\nbloom and fragrance of the garden.\\nLilac-bushes straggled about unpruned, and\\nwere troublesomely prolific. Forty years ago\\nthey stood compactly by the doorsteps and\\nunder the windows of most well-to-do farmers\\nhouses, from their toughness and brightness\\nfit country shrubs. The grateful, abundant\\nthing took kindly to any earth, to any loca-\\ntion, climbing out of shade into sunshine,", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0122.jp2"}, "123": {"fulltext": "HANNAH AND JONATHAN. 117\\nspreading rapidly in bright places, a good\\nworker, and long suffering of ill usage. I\\nremember one, shut into the angle of a tall\\nfence, which, although most dense of foliage,\\nwas the grief of my early childhood, becaus*e\\nof its barrenness; but which, the very first\\nspring it reached the topmost board, was purple\\nwith blossoms.\\nHannah s rose-bushes never had any pruning,\\nsave what nature gave them. Old stocks died\\ndown, and new ones came in their stead.\\nThey seemed always to be dying and coming\\nto life again. They were unmercifully knocked\\nabout and trampled upon by spring workers\\nhens burrowed through their roots; and yet\\nthey always came out every spring as good as\\nnew, and bore the largest and sweetest of\\nroses. I do not see such roses now, so full of\\nscent, so deep-dyed, as the double damask and\\nwhite ones which blossomed in my grand-\\nfather s garden. It seems as if they must\\nhave gotten their strength from the rugged\\nsoil. The damask ones were like peonies for\\nsize, and their bushes, thick with full-blown\\nflowers and buds, in every stage of opening,\\nwere only surpassed for beauty by those of\\nthe creamy- white rose, which were as soft-\\ntinted as the first blush of dawn, and daintily-\\nscented as the quickening breath of spring.", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0123.jp2"}, "124": {"fulltext": "118 ^EW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nHannah s flowers were all sweet-smelling,\\ngracious, hardj, grateful things. Her pinks\\nwere marvels for color and scent. Her bach-\\nelor s buttons, blue and purple and white, per-\\nfumed the morning. Her columbines, wild\\ndenizens of the garden, kept always a wood-\\nland flavor. They got mixed and unsettled as\\nto color, but held fast their untamed nature.\\nThe pride of the garden were the two peony\\nroots, just inside the gate on either side. They\\nwere amongst the earliest comers in spring,\\npeeping up out of the brown mould with their\\ngreat crimson leaf-buds, which speedily thrust\\nup into strong stocks, to be the bearers of as\\nmany blossoms. How those peonies grew\\nITew stocks came up every year, and each new\\nstock seemed to bring with it a peony heavier\\nand deeper-dyed than before. Jonathan tied\\nthem up every season but still they waxed\\nbigger and bigger, until a barrel hoop would\\nnot hold them. They were the envy of all the\\nchildren, and the admiration of farmers wives.\\nPoor unlettered Hannah, so patient in her\\nround of homely toil, so fond of flowers, had\\nan untaught delight in beautiful things. Tread-\\ning with weary feet her toilsome way, she\\ntransmuted the joys and sorrows and stinted\\nincidents of her homely life into pure gold;\\nand making the most of her meagre chances.", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0124.jp2"}, "125": {"fulltext": "HANNAH AND JONATHAN. 119\\nhas compelled me to remember her not so\\nmuch by what she was as by what she might\\nhave been. We can never rate a person justly\\nuntil we have disentangled the story of his or\\nher life from the impetus or hindrance given\\nto it by fortune. What Hannah was I know\\nwhat she might have been is suggested by her\\nlargeness of heart and sweetness of instinct.\\nWith proper scope here this serving-woman\\nmight have been a lady. Who shall say now\\nthat she was not a lady and that what she was\\nequal to, and got not in this life, she is in\\neternity finding in full measure\\nBut Jonathan. Ah, Jonathan what shall\\nI say of thee The first sight I had of thee,\\nthou wast sitting in the old market-wagon,\\nsmoking and cross-legged. When I last saw\\nthee, thou wast sitting in the miller s door, still\\nsmoking and cross-legged. Unshaven, un-\\nshorn, with nose, chin, and cheeks all awry,\\nhis nether garments shrinking from his blue\\nhosen, his bristly hair standing out from his\\nweather-worn hat, Jonathan lounged on the\\nlow stoop, puffing away at his pipe, joking\\nwith Molly and the miller, and interlarding\\nhis slow talk with many a yaw and wall.\\nYet, with all his uncouthness of person,\\ndress, and dialect, he was a true Jonathan,\\nhonest, self-reliant, hard-working, kind even", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0125.jp2"}, "126": {"fulltext": "120 ^^W ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nto gentleness. He was tender of children,\\nand merciful to all dumb creatures. When a\\nyoung lamb chanced to stray from the fold, it\\nwas Jonathan who stayed out two-thirds of\\nthe chilly autumn night until he had found it,\\nand then nursed it until it was strong again.\\nGrood Jonathan, said little Benny, in the\\nwanderings of his sickness. Good Jonathan,\\nechoes my heart after many years.", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0126.jp2"}, "127": {"fulltext": "CHAPTER IX.\\nTHE WEEKLY ROUTINE.\\nThey lived at my grandfather s just as most\\nof the well-to-do ISTew England farmers lived\\nforty years ago. On Monday morning, long\\nbefore sunrise, my grandmother and Han-\\nnah would be busy before two steaming tubs\\nin the long parch. By this early start they\\ngot the freshness of the morning. The sun\\ncame up from behind the distant hills, lifted\\nshadows from the woodland, mist from the\\nvalley, and cast a shimmer upon the dew-\\ncovered fields. It streamed through the porch-\\ndoor, across the floor, past the washers, and\\nexalted what was a little while before only the\\ndull aspect of labor to a share of the bright-\\nness of the morning. There is a transient\\ntime between the uprising of the sun from the\\nhorizon and its full possession of the land-\\nscape, in which there is a sort of pictorial\\naspect of the meeting of day with night, which\\nis exg^uisitely beautiful. Only the country-\\nliver can fully feel it this dying of night\\n9 121", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0127.jp2"}, "128": {"fulltext": "122 ^^W ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nwith the birth of day this supreme moment\\nwhen the mists and dimness and low voices of\\nthe one exhale into the melody and brightness\\nof the other. It is a daily miracle this sud-\\nden transition from gray to rosy light this\\nunrolling of the dew-covered landscape this\\nassumption, in delicious crescendo, of sound\\nthis quickening of the day s life over the\\nsleep of night this flying of darkness, as of\\na ghost pursued, before the flooding of light\\nthis oldest of all stories again told. Awake,\\nfor the day has dawned\\nIn those days women washed who went to\\nchurch in brocades and satins. They used no\\nmachinery, there was no bleaching-powder\\nnor blueing in their tubs, and yet their linen\\ncame out, as Hannah used to say to my grand-\\nmother, as white as the driven snow. These\\ntwo Avomen kept time at their scrubbing, and\\nin the early morning, when they were fresh,\\nhummed psalm tunes together. They were\\nnot belittled by this labor, but by their efiici-\\nency and content they gave dignity to it. It\\nmay have broadened their hands, I am sure\\nit did their chests, but they accepted, with\\nthe utmost willingness, these clumsy and neces-\\nsary toils of their living. How I longed to\\nplunge my arms into the foaming, sparkling,\\nrainbow-tinted suds, in spite of Hannah s", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0128.jp2"}, "129": {"fulltext": "THE WEEKLY ROUTINE. 123\\nbleached, parboiled fingers When Jona-\\nthan had carried the tubs to the well for the\\nfinal rinsing of the linen, it was my care after-\\nw^ards to keep Betsy, the old horse, from\\nwalking under it, flapping snow-white upon\\nthe line. Those washing-days were some of\\nthe best play-days and dream-days of my\\nchildhood. Who can number the bubbles of\\nboth suds and brain which have sparkled and\\nfloated away in the atmosphere of their quaint\\nsurroundings\\nThe east-porch door was, my grandmother\\nsaid, a sightly place. Far away on the\\nhorizon, between two hills, nestled a small\\nhamlet. The deep valley below was dense\\nwith an old forest, from which a belt of green\\nfields arose and fell again to make a bed for\\nthe mill-stream, down to which stretched my\\ngrandfather s broad acres. The mill and the\\nroof of the miller s red cottage were just in\\nsight, and the clatter of wheels and the bab-\\nbling of waters were pleasant to hear. Around\\nthe corner one caught a glimpse of the brook\\nwhere Molly, the miller s daughter, bleached\\nher linen, and Jonathan loitered with her\\nwhen his day s work was done. Farther on\\nwas Benny s little grave.\\nIn that porch-door I used to sit and dream\\naway the day, listening to the harmless talk of", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0129.jp2"}, "130": {"fulltext": "124 ^EW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nthe washers, who never let a traveller go un-\\nheeded on the highway. What innocent gos-\\nsip it was, as I hear it now, whispering through\\nthe years Where is the parson going this\\nearly Who can be sick now the doctor\\nis riding like the wind. I shouldn t think\\nMrs. Brown could spare Sally for school to-\\nday. Thus one by one the wayfarers went\\nby, and the washers watched and babbled\\nuntil they grew tired with their work, and so\\nunobservant and silent.\\nTwice a week, with much method and little\\nbustle, quantities of butter and cheese were\\nmade ready for the market. The unctuous\\nodor of those tasks comes back to me, and I\\nstill taste the all-pervading flavor of the cheese-\\nroom. I see the clumsy press, trickling with\\nsour juices, the polished wooden bowls, the\\nrows of shining pans set out to scald in the\\nsunshine, mistress and maid, in checked home-\\nspun aprons, shaping the golden butter or cut-\\nting the tender curd. Dear, simple-hearted\\nwomen your work was the common task of a\\nfarmer s household, but you made it seem like\\na pastime by the skill you brought to bear upon\\nit. It might have been drudgery in other\\nhands, but in yours it only showed how little\\nthe dignity of labor depends upon what one\\ndoes, and how much upon the way in which", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0130.jp2"}, "131": {"fulltext": "THE WEEKLY ROUTINE. 125\\ntasks are taken up. Untoward accidents\\nsometimes happened. The cream would not\\ngive up its butter, or the cheese cracked in\\nturning, mishaps dreaded by skilful dairy-\\nwomen. Old ^ance, who lived in the edge\\nof the wood, beyond the miller s cottage,\\nwas supposed to bewitch farmer s cows to the\\nspoiling of their products, without mercy, and\\nmany a farmhouse door had nailed upon its\\nlintel a horseshoe as a charm against. her plot-\\ntings. If there was any virtue in them the\\nold woman lay down often at night with un-\\neasy bones. Old I^Tance was a forlorn, crazed\\ncreature, whose early history had been dropped\\nout of speech, and who throve best in her half-\\nsavage woodland life. The farmers added to\\nthe pittance which the selectmen grudgingly\\ngave her, so that she never suiFered for food or\\nclothing. Every ambition had died out of\\nher. She seemed to have but one vestige of\\nhumanity left, and that was her affection for\\nthe living things in the woods about her.\\nBirds were always hovering over her hut, and\\nin winter the snow around it was thick with\\nfootprints of untamed creatures which had\\ncome to pick up the crumbs she had pinched\\nfor them from her poverty. ISTothing could be\\nmore repulsive than this haggard old woman,\\ncrouching over her embers in her one-roomed", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0131.jp2"}, "132": {"fulltext": "126 ^EW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nhut, or groping mth a faded shawl over her\\nhead for fagots amongst the white snow of the\\nforest. She was a hlot upon the landscape,\\nthis waif of humanity stranded alongside the\\npurity of domestic life.\\nUncouth old safe, dearer to my grandmother\\nthan costly bric-a-brac to modern fine lady, no-\\nbody seems to make nowadays such cheeses\\nas bulged out your canvas sides, prettily mot-\\ntled with tansy or wholesome yarrow, and\\ncrumbling under the knife when cut. They\\nhad a toothsome way of dissolving in the\\nmouth, and tickling the palate with a pleasant\\ntingle. The fine grain of the products of my\\ngrandmother s dairy might have been due to\\nthe fineness of her own texture. I have more\\noften tasted far coarser results from like mate-\\nrial. Hers looked and tasted like the work of\\na lady.\\nThe heavy labor of the day over, and the\\nhearth swept and scrubbed, my grandmother\\nand Hannah, who were never idle, sat down\\nto their mending, or the one went to her dis-\\ntaff and the other to her weaving. My grand-\\nmother was never handsomer than she was\\nwhen sitting by her little flax-wheel, with a\\nhandkerchief of white muslin about her neck,\\nher snow-white hair drawn under her plain\\ncap, and the rosy sunlight of the waning day", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0132.jp2"}, "133": {"fulltext": "THE WEEKLY ROUTINE. 127\\nfalling across her faded face and still fine fig-\\nure. Upon her also fell, like a benediction,\\nthat soft-tinted later beauty which is the in-\\nheritance of vigorous, ripe old age. Hannah,\\nglorified by the same sunlight, played her\\nplainer part, and sat by her wheel or at her\\nloom, her attire and mien adjusted to her sta-\\ntion with a sino^ular fitness.\\nThe clatter of the loom in the chamber and\\nthe wdiizzing of the flax-wheel below made a\\nconstant hum of industry in the old farm-\\nhouse. Much wool was also spun, and the\\nmoaning of the big wheel was the saddest\\nsound of my childhood. It was like a low\\nwail from out the lengthened monotony of the\\nspinner s life. I used to stop my ears against\\nit, and many a time have run down to the\\nwoodland to get away from its painful persist-\\nence. The same wail, taking other shapes,\\nhas followed me ever since, and after all there\\nis to every life, even the seemingly most for-\\ntunate, a deep undertone of complaint and re-\\nsistance.\\nMy grandmother s little flax- wheel was a\\ngossipy thing, whirring away at rac}^ bits of\\nnews falling from the lips of demure old ladies\\nin broad frilled caps and square neckerchiefs.\\nHow like they had all grown by walking in\\nthe same rut all their days The only indi-", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0133.jp2"}, "134": {"fulltext": "128 ^^W ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nvidual flavor about them seemed to lie in the\\ndiverse figures on their snuff-box covers, and\\nthe varied stitchings of their goose-quill knit-\\nting-sheaths. How they talked and knit, and\\nknit and talked, with tireless tongues, putting\\nin marks at their narro wings; slowly shaping\\ntheir socks with oft-repeated measurings Upon\\none of them, flighty Huldah, I lookback with\\npeculiar liking. She was a full-blooded little\\ngossip, the kindest of mischief-makers. Every-\\nthing about her, her dried-up, sinewy flgure,\\nsnapping gray eyes and shrill voice, her yawn-\\ning calash, huge reticule, and broad pocket\\nwere in keeping with her calling. Everybody\\nwas glad to see Huldah s blue cotton umbrella\\nbobbing up and down upon the highway and\\nno crone was surer than she of light rolls and\\na strong cup of tea. She always carried an\\numbrella through rain or shine because, she\\nonce confidingly whispered to little Benny,\\nshe was just the least bit flighty in the upper\\nstory. She was particular about the quality\\nof her snuff, and most generous with it. The\\ncow on the cover of her box was the delight\\nof all youngsters. Flighty though she was,\\nshe had, Jonathan said, an uncommon taking\\nway with her. She praised the farmers crops\\nand the gudewives linen. She had a gift of\\nmaking you pleased with yourself. I can hear", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0134.jp2"}, "135": {"fulltext": "THE WEEKLY ROUTINE. 129\\nher now, They du say, Jonathan, that Molly\\nis just the peertest and pootiest gal in town.\\nLors nie Hannah, you can du more work than\\nany other gal. She was most excellent in\\nsickness, endless in patience, and a sleepless\\nwatcher. There was a charm in the very click\\nof her needles, which seemed to keep time\\nwith the blinking of her eyes. I was sure,\\nthough, that many of her stitches were false\\nones, and Hannah held her stockings in high\\ncontempt. Her true hold upon the patience\\nand affections of the people lay in that very\\nflightiness of which she was so pathetically\\nconscious, an infirmity which never fails to\\ntouch the sympathy of the rudest people. She\\nprofessed to live with her brother, although\\nher true abiding-place was with her towns-\\npeople at large. Her unbidden coming always\\nbrought them good. The charities of her\\nsimple heart were as broad and healing as if\\nher brain had been stronger, and the draft\\nshe made upon their pity came back to them\\nin kindly acts. ^N o hearth was ever too\\ncrowded to take her into its circle no hand\\never too busy to grasp hers in welcome. So\\nthis half-crazy woman, chattering and laughing\\nwith a wild wit, with no single external grace\\nto commend her, through the mystic way of\\nhumanity passed like a beatitude across her", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0135.jp2"}, "136": {"fulltext": "130 ^EW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nneighbors thresholds. Her foibles weighed\\nwith them as gossamer but the sweetness of\\nher mission stayed after her. Poor Huldah\\nThe first time I left my grandfather s home\\nalone her cotton umbrella stood by the door.\\nShe herself patted me on the head, called me\\na good child, and gave me a piece of dried\\ngingerbread out of her snufty reticule. The\\ngingerbread I threw into the highway, but the\\nquaint picture of the kind-hearted, wandering\\nold woman many years dead, and whom I\\nnever saw again I cannot throw away.\\nSaturday at my grandfather s brought bak-\\ning, with its morning bustle. Such a hurrying\\nand scurrying and sputtering and splashing as\\nthere was For a short space misrule seemed\\nto have invaded the household. The big\\noven crackled and roared, whilst Jonathan\\nplied it with fuel. Hannah was reckless\\nw^ith milk and eggs. My grandmother kept\\nup a continued rattling of spoons and pans,\\nand I seemed always to be in the way. Grad-\\nually materials took shape. The fire died dow^n\\nin the oven; Jonathan cleared and swept it,\\nand shut it up. Shortly it was opened and\\ntried, and then packed with pots and pans and\\nplates, close up to the brim. Doughnuts sizzled\\nand steamed in the big pot on the crane, and\\nthe scent of food, cooked and uncooked, was", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0136.jp2"}, "137": {"fulltext": "THE WEEKLY ROUTINE. 131\\nfar-reaching and positive, pleasant and appe-\\ntizing. The household, by degrees, settled\\ndown. The doughnuts were skimmed out\\nand the fat set by to cool. The hearth was\\nswept the floors and tables scrubbed soiled\\ngarments were changed for fresh; and, with\\nthe twilight, peace seemed to come in through\\ndoors and windows, peace to rest upon the\\nwhite heads of aged man and aged woman,\\nupon their man-servant and maid-servant,\\nand upon the child within their gates.", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0137.jp2"}, "138": {"fulltext": "CHAPTER X.\\nNEIGHBORS.\\n1\\nThe essence of neigliborliness is line-grained.\\nIts charity sufFeretli long and is kind its hu-\\nmanity never wearieth it is unbound by cus-\\ntom unbought by price a perennial spring\\nan invaluable gift. Behold in a woman your\\nmodel country neighbor. She is lynx-eyed,\\nbut not over-curious spontaneous, but not\\nfamiliar helpful but not aggressive. She\\ntakes note of your necessities, which she re-\\nlieves without ostentation. So great is her\\ngenerosity of effort that she keeps no account\\nin memory of those deeds by which she has\\nmade you her debtor. If she needs you she\\nfreely asks of you. She is more reticent of\\nher words than her works; and weighs well\\nher speech, that by it her social relations may\\nnot be marred. She is unmoved by impulse\\nor prejudice. She may be hard of exterior,\\nbut tenderness dwells in her. If bidden to a\\nfeast she goes to it in her best attire, with\\nserious dignity; but into the sick-room she\\n132", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0138.jp2"}, "139": {"fulltext": "NEIGHBORS. 133\\nglides with unchanged garments, bearing with\\nher the healing of herbs, softness of presence,\\nand a feeling heart.\\nMy first-born was buried from a country\\nhome. His short life had been of no use to\\nany one outside of that home. To my neigh-\\nbors he had left nothing worthy of remem-\\nbrance; he had made hardly a ripple upon\\nthe surface of their quiet lives. He had sim-\\nply come and passed away. Lo what was\\nwrought by the silent mystery of his death.\\nThey thronged about him. They touched his\\nwhite garments with exquisite tenderness, and\\nlet fall upon them tears of pity and love. One\\nof them wrapped him in his winding-sheet,\\nsmoothed his hair prettily, and touched his\\nbrow with a holy, motherly kiss.\\nBeloved country neighbors of another home,\\ndear are the memories of your spontaneous\\nkindness to me and mine, you true, tender-\\nhearted, free-handed, helpful, bygone neigh-\\nbors. Tirzah, Tirzah the good you were\\nhard-worked and plain but you were so\\nclothed upon with self-denial, kindness, and\\ncharity that my children loved you, and you\\nwere beautiful to them. They never missed\\nin you any graces to them you were pure\\ngold. Dear old woman when your weary\\nfeet shall pass over to the shining shore, two,", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0139.jp2"}, "140": {"fulltext": "134 ^^W ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nI am sure, will gladly go down to meet you.\\nKind old Tirzah, may I some time see you in\\nthe beautiful garments of immortality God\\nbless Tirzali lisped Marion, in infantile\\nspeech; and night after night went up this\\nsimple petition until the child s tongue forgot\\nits cunning.\\nMy grandfather s neighbors were scattered\\nover a wide space of country. The nearest\\none of them was half a mile away; but dis-\\ntance only seemed to lend zest to their inter-\\ncourse with one another. Lack of diversion\\nalso gave impulse to it. The drama they all\\nhelped to play was upon a narrow stage, with\\nfew acts and they, the actors in it, were so\\nfar apart that each stood out to the others\\nmost conspicuous for the right or wrong ren-\\ndering of his part. Every incident and acci-\\ndent of one s daily life was, to his neighbor,\\nwhat his costumes are to the player in the\\ntheatre, a sort of marking of him. His horse,\\nhis oxen, his wagon, and his dog identified\\nhim, like the wearing of a stage garment;\\nand all his incomings and outgoings, all the\\nways of his household, were most familiar to\\nhis townspeople. Sunday noonings made\\nneighbors the courtesies of hayings and har-\\nvestings brought them together; and the leis-\\nure of winter revealed each to the other. They", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0140.jp2"}, "141": {"fulltext": "NEIGHBORS. 135\\nwere compelled to be dependent upon, and so\\nkind to, one another, these simple, isolated\\npeople. They found relief from the restraint\\nof labor and the suppression of their working\\ndays in their holiday garrulousness, and their\\neager recognition of every other man and\\nwoman as their neighbor. When clad in\\ntheir best suits, with a little respite from toil,\\ntheir whole natures seemed to rebound; and\\nsilent, stern men became eager chatterers.\\nVery simple gossip it was, mainly of herds\\nand crops and town affairs. They thronged\\nthe meeting-house steps on Sundays, gathered\\nin knots about the village stores, and never\\nfailed on the highway to salute one another\\nwith much speech. The smallest mishap to\\nthe one was speedily known to the rest, and\\nthis large recognition came back manifold in\\nsympathy.\\nExtreme deference was exacted from chil-\\ndren to parents, and from youth to old age.\\nAmongst the men there was little social assump-\\ntion, save that the best thinkers, known as\\nsuch, took unto themselves a certain boldness\\nof speech. Their salutations followed custom,\\nand their common talk ran in grooves but\\nthe mass of them were as strong in logic as\\ntheir soil was in rock; and they were almost\\nas easily turned as the latter from their slow-", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0141.jp2"}, "142": {"fulltext": "136 ^^W ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nformed opinions. They were weather-wise\\nalmost to accuracy, and foretold to one another\\nthe coming and shifting of storms.\\nl^othing could be quainter upon the highway\\nthan the meeting in midsummer of two anx-\\nious farmers in their high-hacked wagons.\\nThey stopped, compared the size and state of\\ntheir exposed crops and then fell to watching\\nthe clouds, each shading his eyes with his hand.\\nHardy, resolute, half-defiant, they had a sort\\nof heathen aspect these sons of and wor-\\nshippers of the soil. Their hopes, and so their\\nhearts, were bound up in the signs of sun and\\nwind and cloud, and they naturally grew into\\nsuch picturesque and harmless idolaters.\\nThe women of my grandfather s neighbor-\\nhood were more given to social distinctions\\nthan the men. The wives of forehanded\\nfarmers and professional men were apt to be\\nsomewhat exalted, or, in the speech of the\\ntimes, looked up to. This was because of\\na partial exemption from toil and they lacked\\nthe intensity, the wild flavor, of those humbler\\nwomen, who threw their whole strength and\\nwill into their vocations, and thus made them-\\nselves worthy of better things. What if these\\nlatter did seem like drudges, and grow hard\\nand ugly to sight; the patience and the power\\nand the will to do were still in them, and the", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0142.jp2"}, "143": {"fulltext": "NEIGHBORS. 137\\nprice tliey paid for their fidelity gave a pathetic\\nnohleness to the sacrifice.\\nThe women were, as a class, religious. They\\nwere not emotional, busy, bustling Christians.\\nThey knew little about missions and Dorcas\\nsocieties. There was not much poverty to tax\\ntheir sympathies. They were learned in doc-\\ntrines, firm of faith, and full of a simple rev-\\nerence. They were never so fagged or bur-\\ndened that they could not, on the Lord s day,\\nlay aside their cares and toils, and go up to\\nHis house. It ought to have been an easy\\nthins: for these women to enter into the kins^-\\ndom. Their life here was so hard upon them\\nthat the life to come must have held out to\\ntheir weary souls a picture, beyond all measure\\ndelightful, of the eternal rest, the everlasting\\npeace of the true gospel.\\nThe meagreness of their lot begot in many\\nof them a stinginess about dollars and cents\\nbut the most carnal-minded of them were truly\\nreverent on the Lord s day and they all en-\\ndured^frost-bites and long sermons, in their\\nun warmed churches, with a praiseworthy pa-\\ntience. Sweet to them was the hush of their\\nrestful Sabbaths. It was the sio;n and token\\nto them of a Sabbath that should never end.\\nWhen their children were young, these an-\\ncient mothers had to clothe them with garments\\n10", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0143.jp2"}, "144": {"fulltext": "188 ^EW ENGLAND BYGONE;^.\\nspun and woven by their own hands and for\\nthe daughters, as they grew up, table-linen\\nand bedding were to be stored away for their\\nfixing out. In m}^ grandmother s day this\\nthrifty forecasting of fate was the custom in\\nfarmers families, and she was deemed rich to\\nwhose treasures gifts of silver and china were\\nalso added. Daughters were expected to marry.\\nMarriage brought extra care and toil to a\\nwoman but she did not shrink from that,\\nfor labor was her lot and she of the humbler\\nsort, to whom no suitor came, was quite sure\\nto take up her narrower vocation as tailoress\\nor dressmaker or household servant. It was\\nthought to be generous in a farmer to let his\\ndaughter learn a trade, thus freeing her\\nfrom the heavier drudgeries of farm-work.\\nThere must have been cheapened lives, but\\nthere were, at least, no idle ones amongst these\\nwomen. They began their lustrous webs in\\nearly girlhood. They accepted their condition\\nas they found it they did with all their might\\nwhat the Lord gave them to do, and so were\\nin their calling true livers.\\nThe tailoress, with her awkward goose,\\nstitching and pressing coarse cloths into\\nhomely garments, grew gray-haired in the\\nservice of friendly neighbors. Her meagre\\npay, through long hoarding, rolled up with", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0144.jp2"}, "145": {"fulltext": "NEIGHBORS. 139\\nyears. She got to be a house-owner and land-\\nowner, and so a woman of repute and weight\\namongst others. Lucy and Hester were two\\nsuch humble neighbors of my grandfather s.\\nThey were in middle life when I knew them;\\ntwo sisters, to whom their ftxther, in dying,\\nhad left a life interest in his house and estate.\\nThis was the usual way in those days of pro-\\nviding for the old age of unmarried daughters\\nnot the most safe or generous way for them,\\nbut consistent with their trainins; and habits\\nof self-reliance. With health, they were sure\\nto be self-supporting, and in sickness and old\\nage they would be cared for, grudgingly it\\nmight be, in the rooms set apart for them in\\nthe old homestead.\\nLucy and Hester might have well dreaded\\nany possible dependence upon their brother, a\\ncrabbed, morose man, whose surly nature\\nseemed to infect his home and all its sur-\\nroundings. It was a dismal, joyless-looking\\nhouse. Seen from a distance, it had a most\\ninhospitable look, unsoftened by any green,\\ngrowing thing, uncorniced, unpainted, grim,\\ncold, forbidding. The room of Lucy and\\nHester seemed to catch all the sunshine lying\\nabout it. Their goose was always pounding\\nat seams, their tongues were always going in\\nconcert, and they were the busiest, cheeriest,", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0145.jp2"}, "146": {"fulltext": "140 ^EW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nplumpest, most prosperous of old maids.\\nThey had money in the hank; how much no\\none knew, hut rumor added to it faster than\\ntheir nimhle fingers could ever have earned it,\\nuntil they came to he esteemed rich women.\\nPeople wondered why they had never mar-\\nried, for they were fair-faced and womanly,\\nand full of lovahleness in their low deg-ree.\\nThey Avere fond of children, and took several\\nlittle hoys to hring up, hut somehow these all\\nturned out hadly. One stole some of their\\nhard-earned money, another tried to hurn\\ntheir house. People said the sisters were too\\neasy with them. It may he, after all, that\\nthey had fallen upon their true vocation, and\\nthat they were jollier and more useful with\\ntheir goose in hand than they would have\\nhe en as wives and mothers.\\nJoseph their hrother did not mar their com-\\nfort much, for they were not in his power.\\nHis wife died early of overwork, leaving her\\ntasks and her discomforts as an inheritance\\nto her daughter. This daughter, Ahigail hy\\nname, was a tall, thin, hut sweet- faced girl,\\nwho, when I first saw her, was drudging her\\nlife out for her cruel father. She had a lover\\nin a well-to-do farmer from the next town,\\nhut she never married. The linen was all\\nspun and woven and packed away the hridal", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0146.jp2"}, "147": {"fulltext": "NEIGHBORS. 141\\ndress was made ready, and then, one June da}^,\\nshe who was to have worn it was borne out\\nto the family burial-place.\\nNot long after the father died suddenly and\\nunmourned. Then Lucy and Hester came\\ninto full possession of the farm. They took\\ndown the little sign Tailoring done here\\nfrom their window, planted lilacs^ and rose-\\nbushes about the house, and trained a creeper\\nover the front door. They did not make many\\nchanges, but somehow the dismal look went\\nout of the place, and the cheer, which before\\nwas confined to their own one room, now\\nseemed to pervade the whole house. They\\nwere become, for the country, truly rich\\nwomen; but, from force of habit, they kept\\nbasting and stitching and pressing until their\\ngoose grew too heavy for them. Then, from\\nbeino: the two tailoresses who worked about\\nthe town, they passed into the two cheerful\\nold sisters, whose serene latter years and calm\\nend were a rest and a lesson to their weary\\nneighbors.\\nYery faithful to each other in their marriage\\nrelations were these ancient men and women.\\nThey were given neither to sentiment nor dem-\\nonstration. The women promised to honor\\nand obey their husbands and they did honor\\nand obey them, not with weak servility but", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0147.jp2"}, "148": {"fulltext": "142 ^EW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nwitli trust and willingness. The twain were\\ntruly yoked together to bear life s burdens\\nand, working side by side, year after year,\\nthey grew to be most helpful and needful and\\ndear to each other. Theirs may not have been\\nthe highest type of marriage, but such as it\\nwas it made each a necessity to the other, and\\nwhatever it lacked in grace and beauty it made\\nup in truth and stability. If there was in it\\nany actual or implied degradation of woman,\\nthis was shown in the preference of sons over\\ndaughters in the disposition of their small\\nestates. The thrift and fixing out of the\\nlatter were thought to be sufficient for them,\\nand the farm with its belongings was given to\\nthe sons. As a subject of contemplation, as\\na Sabbath picture divorced from toil, the pas-\\ntoral, patriarchal life of one of these ancient\\nfamilies has a Biblical aspect, something of\\nthe sweetness and simplicity of those histori-\\ncal households of Abraham and Isaac and\\nJacob. It was the life of a race of strong-\\nminded, heroic. Christian laborers, who, from\\na substratum of mental, moral, and religious\\nstrength, sent forth a stream of migration as\\npotent as the rivers which take their rise from\\nthe granite rock of their farms. If the women\\nhad been put forward forty years, many of\\nthem would have lost what now seem their", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0148.jp2"}, "149": {"fulltext": "NEIGHBORS, 143\\npeculiarities, and with them their chief charm,\\nunder the weight of what we call our superior\\ncivilization. But there was a certain class,\\nsmall in numher as it always is, Avhom no time\\nnor circumstance could have spoiled. They\\nwere nohle women, women full of all man-\\nner of well-doing; fair to look upon, with the\\nbeatitudes stamped upon their features as upon\\nthe pages of a written book; women who,\\nwalking in their humble condition, meek and\\nlowly, came to be looked upon as in a measure\\nsanctified, and were called mothers in Israel.\\nTheir faces, set heavenward, cling to memory\\nlike the portraits of painted madonnas.\\nOther women there were, more worldly wise,\\nunder whose cunning hands the plainer women\\nof the neighborhood were as potter s clay, my\\ngrandmother was of such, sensible, handsome\\nwomen, whom no measure of labor could be-\\nlittle, full of magnetism and power and wide\\ninfluence.\\nThe stories of many of these ancient home-\\nworkers, written out, would be so many leaves\\nfrom that pioneer, formative life which so em-\\nbellishes and enriches the early history of N ew\\nEngland. They were home missionaries, who\\ngave to their neighbors their unsalaried labor,\\nand to posterity the fruits of their wide-sown\\nhumanities and Christian graces. I have seen", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0149.jp2"}, "150": {"fulltext": "144 ^^W ENGLAND BYGONES.\\na whole village uplifted by the superior nature\\nof a single grand, thinking, faithful. Christian\\nwoman. She was the wife of a poorly-paid\\ncountry minister. Her home was meagre, hut\\nher love of beauty great. She was not there-\\nfore poor, for what the country could give to\\nany woman it gave to her. Her field seemed\\nnarrow, for her ability was large but if her\\nstandard of living overreached that of her\\nneighbors, her example stimulated their chil-\\ndren to higher effort. Her mission was pecu-\\nliar. Analyzed, its integral parts were small,\\nin its aggregate not greatly recognized at the\\ntime, afterwards felt. The life of this well-\\npoised woman, wide in creative power but\\nnarrow-gauged by circumstance, in aspect\\nbare, in actual experience full of the sadness\\nof suppression, went day by day into the\\nchildren about her, and that scope which was\\ndenied to herself she helped to give through\\nthem to their posterity.\\nShe was neither stranded nor martyred. It\\nwas her vocation that, because of the nobility\\nof her nature, she should, shape those who\\ncopied after her. It was her lot that the self-\\nsacrifice which was engrafted upon her other\\nvirtues should give to her life a pensive\\nbeauty; that she should better others by a\\ncertain impoverishment of self. What she", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0150.jp2"}, "151": {"fulltext": "NEIGHBORS. 145\\nlonged for and got not, guided by her, others\\nfound. Her glory was that her true being was\\nnot bound by circumstance. She was not sim-\\nply a village woman, she was a citizen of the\\nworld, for in giving wider sphere to others,\\nshe was only committing to them that part of\\nher higher life most worthy to be developed\\nand remembered.", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0151.jp2"}, "152": {"fulltext": "CHAPTER XL\\nSUNDAY.\\nDear, delicious, bygone country Sabbaths,\\nhow out of harmony bustle and striving\\nseemed with your days A woman minding\\nher dairy or a farmer storing his hay made a\\nscandal, and a certain decorous dignity was\\ngiven to necessary labor. How the aspect of\\nthe landscape changed with the ending of tlie\\nweek s tasks! Individual life tells in the\\ncountry. Farmers digging in their fields,\\ndairywomen busy before their doors, loitering\\nchildren, working oxen, all motions begotten\\nof labor are greatly missed when withdrawn.\\nThe stillness of the Sabbath at my grand-\\nfather s was almost oppressive. ^N ot a worker\\nwas to be seen, hardly a loiterer, only the\\nsilent processes of nature went on in the de-\\nserted fields. There was something sublime\\nin this universal ovation of quiet to the sacred-\\nness of the day, in this giving to the Sabbath\\nthat full possession of rest ordained for it\\nin its old creation. It was the instinct of a\\n146", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0152.jp2"}, "153": {"fulltext": "SUNDA Y. 147\\nprimitive and pure devotion, the spiritual ex-\\npression of a people who knew of no compro-\\nmise with duty. The keeping of the Lord s\\nday meant with them a giving up of all work-\\nday pursuits. The thoughts of many of them\\nmay have run in profane channels, but if so\\nthey gave no outward sign. If they forecasted\\nto themselves plans for the coming week, they\\ntold not of it, and the most eager worker of\\nthem all fell readily into the subdued spirit of\\nthe day.\\nThe farmers used to sit much by the win-\\ndows of their living-rooms and look com-\\nplacently over their fields. No wonder they\\nloved their lands, for these had given back, for\\nyearly care and toil, an hundred-fold in health\\nand delight. I seem to see the old miller,\\nready for meeting, lounging in a rush-bot-\\ntomed chair outside his little red cottage under\\nthe hill. The mill has stopped its clatter,\\nMolly loiters with her pitcher at the spring,\\nand the gray old house-dog lies on the door-\\nstone snapping at flies in the sunshine. The\\nminutest feature of that Sunday morning pic-\\nture comes back to me the lazy drone of the\\nbees about the hive under the cherry-tree the\\nrow of sunflowers close by the garden-fence,\\ntilting their faces up to the sun the garden\\nitself, full of savory herbs and, above all, the", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0153.jp2"}, "154": {"fulltext": "148 ^EW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\ntrim, rotund miller, his ruddy face set off by\\na broad collar, and liis meeting suit untar-\\nnislied by meal or flour. He was always wait-\\ning there every sunny Sabbath morning, so\\nthat he became a permanent feature of the\\nlandscape as seen from my grandfather s porch-\\ndoor. The unhewn, flat stone step of that\\ndoor was a cheerful place. Close by it were\\nthe cucumber-bed, the dairy-bench, and the\\nbeehives. No pans were put out to scald on\\nSunday, the unpicked cucumbers grew apace,\\nand the bees revelled in blossoms. It Avas\\nthe brightest, homeliest, rankest spot about\\nthe house.\\nA farm-house back-door is a paradise for\\nweeds, and there is beauty in all these unbid-\\nden growths of the rank soil. They are over-\\nburdened with a wild scent, dense of foliage,\\ndeep of color, profuse of blossom, and prolific\\nof seed. They locate themselves humbly and\\nhave few friends; but hardly one of them is\\nwithout its use, and none of them would be\\nunmissed from back-door vegetation. Here\\ngrew the unctuous cheeses of school repute\\nthe beggarly plantain, close up to the steps,\\ngood for woodland poisons; edible dock and\\nmustard, and many meaner weeds, redeemed\\nby their riotous rankness. They were not\\nworthless, for out from them came healing and", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0154.jp2"}, "155": {"fulltext": "SUNDA Y. 149\\nfood and dyes. They were riot mean, for they\\nwere an outcropping of the force of the earth,\\nand so were an eloquent miracle of the life of\\nthe year.\\nThe miller s Sunday suit cost much effort,\\nfrom the first clipping of the wool of which\\nit was made to the final handling of it hy\\nLucy and Hester, the two tailoresses, who\\nmeasured and stitched and pressed at the rate\\nof two shillings per day. It did not fit well,\\nbut for wear and tear it Avas unsurpassed; and\\nits owner had the consciousness that it had\\nbeen honestly paid for, and would not have for\\na long time to be renewed. The broad collars\\nof the men were made of homespun linen,\\ntheir boots were clumsy, their hands coarse\\nand distorted by labor but they were sover-\\neigns of the soil strong, brave, honest men.\\nThe dress of the better-conditioned class of\\nwomen was much finer. Many of them owned\\nrich satins and brocades. This outlay was,\\nhowever, only for once or twice in a lifetime,\\nand the heirlooms of imported stufts which\\nhave come down from my grandmother were,\\nwithout doubt, her show-dresses for many\\nyears. There was something sweet in this\\nexalting by fine apparel of a mother of a\\nhousehold, in this hinting of vanity in these\\nsimple women, who would gladly have bought", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0155.jp2"}, "156": {"fulltext": "l50 J^EW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nand worn the silken fabrics which they could\\nnot simulate in their own webs.\\nBehold the stately pomp of my grand-\\nmother s church-going. Jonathan brings the\\ntwo-wheeled chaise to the front door, and out\\nfrom the spare room comes a shimmer of\\nblack satin and lace, and the figure of a woman,\\nlarge, tall, white-haired, fair-faced, handsome,\\ngrand as any fashionable lady of to-day. In\\nthe hands which on the morrow are to help\\ndo the family washing she carries a folded\\nkerchief of fine quality, a hymn-book, and a\\nsprig of Southern-wood. She looks, as I re-\\nmember her, with no mark of earthly toil\\nupon her form and visage, like a quaint old\\nportrait of a queen somewhere seen. Yerily,\\nwhat did this woman lose by the cheerful\\ntaking up of life s allotted burdens\\nWives and daughters of the less well-to-do\\nfarmers seldom owned more than one best\\ngown, and that of simple material but their\\nclean frocks looked wonderfully well, and the\\ncheeks of the lasses were brighter than any\\nribbons they could buy. They were pleasant\\nto behold as they walked in procession, every\\nSunday, to the meeting-house. The wild coun-\\ntry round about ran riot with vegetation, and\\nthey were a part of its brightness.\\nThere was chance for romance in those", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0156.jp2"}, "157": {"fulltext": "SUNDA Y. l5l\\nchurch-bound walks, and many a well-to-do\\nyoung farmer chose to go across the fields\\nwith his lass rather than by the dusty high-\\nway. At meeting-time, by the gate of almost\\nevery green lane stood a lumbering market-\\nwagon, waiting for the gudewife and her\\nlittle ones, whilst the squire and the doctor\\npassed by in pretentious chaise. The highway\\nwas thronged with eager w^orshippers, fathers\\nand mothers, lads and lasses, many little chil-\\ndren, with here and there an old man or\\nwoman. All were resting, happy, reverent.\\nWhen the crowd had reached the meeting-\\nhouse, the women and children and young girls\\npassed in but the fathers and older sons lin-\\ngered around the porch, the former to ex-\\nchange greetings, the latter to stare at the\\nblushing maidens. The young people were\\nnot free from that coquetry the seeds of which\\nwere sown in Eden, and which is as old as\\nEve. It took the girls a long time beforehand\\nto adjust their simple dress. On Sunda}^ morn-\\nings, Molly, the miller s daughter, used to plas-\\nter water curls upon her rosy cheeks. If her\\nface was not adorned bv them, she herself was\\ntruly made more lovely by this simple tribute\\nto the church-door homage of her rustic lover.\\nThe meeting-house was a quaint old struc-\\nture, a fair specimen of buildings of its class", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0157.jp2"}, "158": {"fulltext": "152 ^J^W ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nin those days. It had the hanging, cylindrical\\nsounding-hoard; high pulpit, with its trap-\\ndoor; railed altar; broad galleries; double\\nrow of small windows and square pews,\\nthe whole built of plain, unpolished wood.\\nIt was not planned by skilful architects, yet,\\ndespite the ugliness of this old meeting-house,\\nthere was about it a kind of solemn grandeur.\\nIt was lofty and roomy, and had the vener-\\nableness which long use gives to any structure.\\nCobwebs hung in its out-of-the-way corners\\nage had richly stained the rude carvings of its\\nuseless sounding-board and curiously-twisted\\nveins and knots had come out, in long years,\\nall over the panels of its galleries. There is\\nsomething pathetic in this creeping out of the\\nveins and fibres of ancient wood as if they\\nwere the soul of it to meet the destroying\\ntouch of time. Rare also is the aroma of these\\ndying woods, breathing out from such as are\\nmellow and brown and streaked with age;\\nfound only in old, unpainted buildings.\\nOn summer days, through the open windows\\nof this ancient church came resinous breezes\\nfrom the pine wood beyond it, sunshine, and\\nthe sounds of busy, ripening, summer life. It\\nwas filled also with a reverent spirit of worship,\\nand by them all it was glorified into a solemn\\nand goodly temple. The coming up of the", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0158.jp2"}, "159": {"fulltext": "SUNDAY. 153\\nminister s white head from the trap-door, the\\nnasal twang of the long-queued deacon dicta-\\nting to his choir, the contortions of the fiddler,\\nwere all accepted as a part of the service, and\\nthe people were as unconscious of any element\\nof the grotesque in their worship as they were\\nrich in faith and divine presence. The musical\\ndirectors of ancient choirs might not have been\\ngood singers, hut they were most devout choral\\nworshippers of the Lord on the Lord s Day.\\nAncient meeting-houses had no chimneys, and\\nthe tiny foot-stoves of the women could not\\nkeep their bodies warm in winter. One can\\nbut think that perhaps the sturdiness of these\\nancient dames was in some measure due to\\nthe fact that the weakly ones were, in early\\nlife, winnowed out by exposure to such hardy\\ncustoms.\\nMy grandfather s old meeting-house on\\nsummer days was a picture-gallery, letting in\\nrare landscapes through its windows. The\\nmeanest objects framed in these, and fixed by\\nthem upon a background of sky or verdure,\\nbecame studies to tired, curious children, who\\nlet nothing pass by the doors unnoticed upon\\nthe visible highway. The stay-at-homes in the\\nfew neighboring houses were eagerly watched,\\nand all the details of the houses themselves\\naccurately scanned by them. They grew wise\\n11", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0159.jp2"}, "160": {"fulltext": "154 ^EW ENGLAND B YO NES.\\nas to the habits and haunts of meeting-house\\nspiders and bugs, and noted every bird-nested\\ntree which could be seen from the pews. Every\\nobject within range of vision they knew well by\\nsight. IlTothing escaped them but the doctrines\\nof the minister s long discourses.\\nWhat country-bred person will not recall\\nwith pleasure such unwitting Sunday studies\\nof art, when he or she learned aerial perspective\\nthrough the upper windows of a village church,\\nand the best style of lawn-gardening from the\\nlandscape which stretched out from their lower\\npanes to the horizon All the natural beauties\\nof the neighborhood were revealed; many\\nsecrets of form and sound and color were\\nsearched out until, through these primary\\ndealings with nature, a glimpse was given of\\nthe fulness and richness and glory of the uni-\\nverse.\\nThe old-time country pastors were greatly\\nloved and respected by their people. They\\nwere treated with peculiar deference. They\\nwere accosted with humility and entertained\\nwith delight. They were poorly paid, but, like\\ntheir parishioners, their habits were simple\\nand wants few and many of them eked out\\ntheir living by the use of land lent them by\\nthrifty farmers. The Congregation alist min-\\nisters were the most learned men of the times", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0160.jp2"}, "161": {"fulltext": "SU^DA Y. 155\\ngenerally close students, rigid in doctrine,\\nstern in discipline, and given to long, many-\\nheaded sermons. Other denominations be-\\nlieved less in especial training for the pulpit\\nand more in what was termed a call to\\npreach. Laymen left their ploughs and be-\\ncame exhorters and the genuine call often\\ndeveloped rare power to control minds. The\\neloquence and success of some of these called\\npreachers of my grandfather s neighborhood\\nhave passed into tradition. They showed an\\nacuteness in the selection and adaptation of\\ntexts which often proved the seed of great\\nrevivals. Said one of these pastors, venerable\\nwith age, as he bowed over the coffin of an old\\npatriarch, named Jacob, who in the fulness of\\na healthy and honored old age had died -sud-\\ndenly in the night-time, And when Jacob\\nhad made an end of commanding his sons, he\\ngathered up his feet into the bed and yielded\\nup the ghost, and was gathered unto his\\npeople. The utterance, the attitude, the as-\\npect of the trembling old pastor were perfect,\\nand more potent than any sermon upon this\\ndesirable ending of a long and worthy life.\\nAt another time, leaning over the pulpit, he\\npointed to the shrouded form of a strong man,\\nstricken down by the wayside, and exclaimed,\\nin low and searching accents, Who among", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0161.jp2"}, "162": {"fulltext": "156 ^^W ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nyou will give lieed to this Who Avill hearken\\nand hear for the time to come V Waiting, with\\nsolemn impressiveness, answer came to him in\\nthe sudden uprising of every member of the\\ncongregation. This inspired old man was\\ngathered to his fathers. He was greatl}^\\nmissed. Even little children mourned him,\\nand for a long time the mention of his name\\nbrought tears.\\nIn those days seldom was an aged minister\\ncast off by his people because of his years. He\\nwas more apt to be endeared to them by his\\ninfirmities, and his speech to grow weighty\\nwith them in proportion to his past work and\\nexperience. The deference paid to him, espe-\\ncially by the 3 Oung, was extreme. Plis learn-\\ning, his freedom from coarser toil, his better\\nattire, exalted the minister s vocation at any\\ntime of life; and when to the superiority of it\\nwas added the venerableness of vears, he be-\\ncame to them a true patriarch like the priests\\nof old, as one ordained of God and not of men.\\nMy grandfather s minister, when I used to\\nvisit the farm, was a trembling old man, with\\nbroken voice but the thought of his dismissal\\nnever entered the mind of one of his hearers,\\nand to talk of his death as a near probability\\ncut their hearts as a personal bereavement.\\nGray-haired women spoke of him as belong-", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0162.jp2"}, "163": {"fulltext": "SUNDA Y. 157\\ning to a past generation. He had buried their\\nparents, had given them in marriage, and\\nbrought liis wisdom to bear upon the good\\nand evil experiences of their after-life. He\\nhad been an eloquent man, and the inspira-\\ntion of his speech had not yet quite left him.\\nIndeed, there could be no eloquence more\\neffectual than the simple appeals which came\\nfrom the pious hearts and truthful lips of such\\nwell-tried pastors. From living so long with\\none people, they grew into their lives. There\\ncould be no joy or sorrow in the parish in\\nwhich the beloved pastor was not called to\\nshare. The average sermons of those days,\\nmeasured by rules of rhetoric, might, many\\nof them, seem bare but most of them were\\nstrong in logic, and they were all full of heart\\nand truth, and so of power.\\nAt noon, between Sunday services, the peo-\\nple scattered in winter, with their lunch-bas-\\nkets, amongst the nearest farm-houses in\\nsummer the mothers, with their little ones, did\\nthe same, whilst the sturdy farmers lolled on\\nthe green. Lads and lasses strolled into the\\nfields, where lovers sat down under the maples\\nand oaks, or the willows by the brook-side.\\nChildren and sober maidens, like Hannah,\\nwere apt to turn into the church-yard. Many\\nof the meeting-goers had some precious spot", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0163.jp2"}, "164": {"fulltext": "158 ^^W ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nin that earth, and they never seemed to tire of\\nreading the legends on the unpretending stones.\\nAfter the hour s nooning came tlie after-\\nnoon s service, just as long and strong in doc-\\ntrine as that of the morning, and woe betide\\nthe uneasy youngster or dozing farmer upon\\nwhom the tithingman s watchful eye might\\nfalL Sweet were the homeward walks, when\\nlovers loitered and parents grew less austere.\\nThe rest of the day was wellnigh past, hut its\\npeace lingered. Its waning light fell with\\na soft glow upon fields and highway and\\nhome-hound worshippers. The latter, for a\\nfew transient hours freed alike from the cares\\nAvhich were past and the cares which were to\\ncome, jrrew kindlv aiiectioned one towards\\nanother. This new-born life was decorous and\\nsweet. Children joined one another; young\\nhearts went out to meet young hearts and, at\\nthe end of every green lane, neighbors parted\\nwith hand-shakes and good wishes. While\\nthis pleasant pageant was passing from the\\nhighway, the herds came up from the pastures.\\nThe duties of the new week crowded up to\\nthe twilight of tlie old Sabbath, and shortly\\nthe highway was deserted and silent.", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0164.jp2"}, "165": {"fulltext": "CHAPTEE XII.\\nOLD TREES.\\nThe flavors of fruits which you have eaten\\nin childhood strangely cling to you. You\\ntaste them in memory, and your mouth liter-\\nally waters for them. You never get such\\napples now as Bill and Joe used to carry to\\nthe village school. They came, most likely,\\nfrom a hoard in the hay-mow if so, they\\nwere stolen from the best trees of some far-\\nmer s orchard. Happy the boy or girl who in-\\nnocently ate of the mellowed apples of such a\\nhoard, which had been forced into ripening in\\ntheir nest of dried o-rass. Their flavors were\\nshut in by darkness, and their scents and tints,\\nwdiich would have exhaled in daylight, passed\\npermanently into them. Their pulp melted\\nand trickled through the fingers of eaters,\\nwith a deep color and a far-reaching odor.\\nBrought out from the pockets of boys and\\ngirls, they were as bright and fresh as the eyes\\nwhich longed for them.\\nStraying through a field or pasture in child-\\n159", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0165.jp2"}, "166": {"fulltext": "160 ^^W ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nliood, you have come upon a wild tree loaded\\nwith fruit, of which you have plucked and\\neaten. You were hardy and hungry, and they\\nseemed to you the best apples you had ever\\ntasted. Passing that way in after-years, you\\ncall to mind this fruit s high relish, and are\\ncurious to try it again. You find the tree,\\nhalf rotten, hut its live limbs still bearing.\\nYou search in vain for apples like the old\\nones. You fling them from you by the doz-\\nens, for you find them all, whether on the tree\\nor on the sod, sour and knotty and mean.\\nYou wonder whether the fine flavor has gone\\nout of the apple with the decay of the tree, or\\na keen appreciation has gone out of you. No\\nmatter which once you liked it, and the tradi-\\ntion will always be a real and pleasant thing.\\nFruit tastes better picked up from a sod. A\\nyellow apple bedded in a tuft of green grass,\\nbesprinkled with dew, and crisp with early\\nripeness, palatable as you snatch it, may be a\\ncrabbed thing when bought from a huckster s\\nstall. I used to eat freely of sweets and sours\\nin my grandfather s orchard, and daily made\\nits round, thrusting aside the grass for wind-\\nfalls, puckering my mouth with acrid juices,\\nflinging clubs and stones at favorite branches,\\nand filling my pocket with fresh-fallen fruits.\\nVery few of its apples were positively uneat-", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0166.jp2"}, "167": {"fulltext": "OLD TREES. 161\\nable. This one might set your teeth on edge,\\nor make your throat tingle, but you were\\nlikely, the very next time you passed the tree\\nthat bore it, to snatch at the same branch for\\nthe sake of the smart. Apples which, when\\ncarried into the house and left lying about for\\na day or two, were thrown away as useless for\\ncooking, picked freshly fallen from the earth\\nhad a keen, spicy tang, pleasant if sparsely\\ntaken.\\nThere is hardly any wild apple so worthless\\nthat in it does not lurk a latent sweetness,\\nwaiting to be let loose by some condition of\\ntime or place, a racy and transient flavor to\\nbe caught on the wing. A toothmark sufficed\\nfor some of my grandfather s apples, for others\\na single mouthful many were to be half\\neaten, wormy windfalls, for instance, and the\\nfruits of certain trees with sodden, watery\\ncores. Others, mild and fine-grained, were\\nrelishable close up to the hulls. A few, com-\\npact with malic worth, seemed utterly to dis-\\nsolve. Such fruit was to be found here and\\nthere in all old orchards, the delight of chil-\\ndren, and oddly named by farmers wives,\\npudding-sweets, long-noses, red-cheeks, and\\nthe like wild apples, not large, but well\\nshaped, finely colored, and of good grain.\\nPaths went straight from the back-doors to", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0167.jp2"}, "168": {"fulltext": "162 ^EW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nthese trees, and the grass under them was\\nmatted and tangled. Trails were apt to lead\\nfrom them to gaps in the walls, and much of\\ntheir plumpest fruitage found its way into the\\nhoards of thieving boys. The rich flavor of\\nthem all was due to their utter freshness. The\\ntrue aroma of any fruit comes from the life of\\nit, life drawn from the sunshine, the showers,\\nthe air, and soil of its own locality. When\\nyou pluck it it begins to die. It follows, then,\\nthat the products of your own soil give to you\\nalone their true ownership, and the finest re-\\nward of your tillage is that to you only can\\nthey offer their unimpaired juices.\\nI knew a tree once old when I first saw it,\\ndead now which stood in an angle of a coun-\\ntry garden. Close in the corner was a rhubarb-\\nroot, and along the fence a row of currant-\\nbushes rank growths all of them, but good\\nhiding-places for windfalls. N^ever was a tree\\nso beset and persecuted as this. Its higher\\nbranches always hung fall of forked sticks\\nthe hard-trodden sod under it was thick with\\nleaves, and the currant-bushes and rhubarb-\\nroot were trampled and torn. Three or four\\nof its huge branches stretched over the fence,\\nand the smart-weed bed underneath them was\\nalways hunted by eager children. Long poles\\nwere lying about outside, which, after all the", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0168.jp2"}, "169": {"fulltext": "OLD TREES. 163\\napples had been knocked from these overhang-\\ning- branches, were slyly thrust under the fence\\nfor more, and this was called hooking by\\nthe youQg pilferers. This apple-tree made\\nearly risers of the children of the house which\\nowned it; and after a storm sharp was the\\ncontest for the gathering of its windfalls. It\\nhad a slow decay, a natural kind of ageing, and\\nleft off bearing limb by limb. The sparser\\nits fruit was the more precious it grew, and\\nthe last few apples of the season were always\\nthe best esteemed of all. They were truly\\nwonderful apples, piquant things, small,\\nbright yellow without, mottled with brown-\\nedged, crimson spots snow white and spark-\\nling within; tasting best when knocked out,\\nlate in autumn, from the fork of some high-\\nup branch. It was only a great, wild, apple-\\ntree, but it grew into the life of the house, and\\nthe whole summer long gave to it a surprising\\nmeasure of beauty and comfort. Its blossoms\\nwere of pink and white, the prettiest of their\\nkind, and they perfumed a whole village. The\\nsettino of its fruits was the delight of all the\\nneighbors children, and the giving of them,\\nwhen ripened, became a hospitality. They were\\nthick^and beautiful amongst the green leaves,\\nand the underlying sod, enriched by them, was\\nthe best-beloved spot of the whole garden.", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0169.jp2"}, "170": {"fulltext": "164 ^^W ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nUngrafted trees have a riotous way of grow-\\ning, making up in size what they Lack in fruit-\\nage and tlie thinnest-hearing of them, when\\nin hlossom, perfames the air as sweetly as the\\nbest. The trees in my grandfather s orchard\\nwhich bore the meanest fruit seemed to have\\nthe most and brightest blossoms, and for a few\\ndays were the glory of the landscape. You\\ncan never forget the scent of apple-blossoms\\nnor, when once seen, the beauty which is given\\nto plain tilings by them. An old apple-orchard\\nhas a pathetic interest. Its trees decay slowly,\\nlingering after those who planted them, with\\ngnarled trunks and distorted limbs, keeping\\nwatch over the ruins of deserted homesteads.\\nIf you see a few, solitary, half-dead apple-trees\\nin a field, or stumps of trees buried in suckers,\\nnear them you will be quite sure to find a cellar,\\nfilled with stones and bricks and tangled\\nwild-growth, the site of an ancient home.\\nYou may find these dying old trees overhang-\\ning the walls of grass-grown country highways.\\nIf you will dislodge their tumbled fruit from\\nbetween the stones, you will often be well re-\\npaid by their wild and racy flavor. Even if\\nyou cannot eat them, they are pleasant to look\\nupon and the tree which, in all lands, best\\nholds its own, which seems nearest to you, is\\nthe tree which has always been a generous", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0170.jp2"}, "171": {"fulltext": "OLD TREES. 165\\ngiver to yon, tlie homely, grateful, apple-\\ntree.\\nBest of all orchards, my grandfather s, fnll of\\ngreat trees, waxing old and weak with their\\ntrunks rotted, their barks shaggy, their limbs\\nall dead at the ends. Dear old orchard, with\\nyour smooth turf, your many fierce-fruited\\ntrees, your few but sufficient ones bearing\\napples of rare worth Going back in mem-\\nory to your gathering, I walk straight to the\\nsweet trees and the sour trees of your best\\nrepute. I hear the thud of your brimful\\ncarts, pouring their loads into the press, and\\nsee busy hands heaping up the fallen fruit.\\nThe gifts, that the summer suns and winds\\nand rains have given to you, lie beautiful upon\\nthe earth, in balls of crimson and green and\\ngold. Your yearly mission is over, and the\\nair is fragrant with the life that has passed\\ninto them and out of you, with the growing\\nand ripening of the year. I forget,\u00e2\u0080\u0094 the thing\\nwas and is not the harvest was bountiful,\\nand was gathered in the trees waxed old and\\ndied.\\nOn the side of the orchard nearest the house\\na row of later-planted trees had been grafted,\\nbut with so little care as to stock that their\\nfruits were no better than cross-breeds, with a\\nstrong leaning to native wildness. Moreover,", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0171.jp2"}, "172": {"fulltext": "166 ^^W ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nthe trees themselves, too old for the process,\\ndid not take to it. They were unhealthy and\\ntricky of bearing, and seemed to be trying to\\nthrust off their superadded branches. Many\\nof the oldest trees were rotten to the core, yet\\nstill persisted in bringing to the orchard their\\nyearly gift of leafage, flower, and fruit. After\\na strong wind it was always feared that one or\\nmore of them would be found prostrate upon\\nthe ground. The fall of one sent a thrill of\\nsorrow through the household. It was sure to\\nhave been endeared by some tender association,\\nhad been marked by a name, and was not\\nlightly to be parted with. It was pitiful to\\nlook at its branches, heaj)ed and crushed, cov-\\nered with their last greenness its trunk jagged\\nand rotten a worthless wreck to be put out\\nof sight.\\nThe wild pear was a hard, uneatable thing,\\nproperly called choke-pear. Unlike the apple,\\nit never surprised you by any palatable varia-\\ntions, and, save that the housewives sometimes\\nstewed it into a tolerable preserve, it was of\\nlittle use.\\nThe garden cherries of ancient homesteads\\nwere less untamed, more serviceable than the\\npears. Almost every garden held two or three\\ntrees, the fruit of which was much esteemed\\nfor cookery. This cherry was round, plump.", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0172.jp2"}, "173": {"fulltext": "OLD TREES. 167\\nricWy red, and thoroughly rehshahle when\\nplucked from the sunny side of a well-tended\\ntree. A profuse hearer, this tree, with its high\\ncontrast of fruit and glossy, dark-green leaves,\\nwas an ornamental thing, often standing in the\\nfront yard of the house. It was apt to straggle\\nin its growth and get shaggy as to its hark,\\nhut was pleasant to look upon from its white\\nhlossoming until it was stripped hy the frost.\\nIt was an early hloomer, thrusting out its\\nsnow-white petals hefore its leaf-buds had\\nhurst open, almost the first floral gift of spring\\nto the quickening life of the garden. All\\ncherry-blossoms have an untamed look and\\nscent, as if in them the richness and flavor\\nwhich goes into later flowers had gotten snow-\\nbound. They are very dainty; they come\\nsuddenly, and flutter and fall and melt away,\\nas if they were really born out of frost-work.\\nLittle children used to carry sprays of them to\\nschool, and later they beset the trees for fruit,\\nfighting with the birds for their short-lived\\nharvest. I remember two great, scraggy, old\\ntrees, hard to climb, whose close-set branches\\nnipped like a vice, but which held, quite up in\\nthe sky, fruit full of imprisoned sunshine. For\\nseveral weeks, in cherry-time, they were noisy\\ntrees. There were always two or three children\\nwedo-ed between their forked branches, who", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0173.jp2"}, "174": {"fulltext": "168 N-EW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nchattered and ate and kept a flutter amongst\\nthe flockins: birds.\\nHalf-way between the house and woodland\\nwas a wild cherry-tree, which bore blossom\\nand fruit with a riotous profuseness. The wild\\ncherry was a savage of its kind. This one rose\\nstraight as an arrow from a heap of rocks a tall,\\nhandsome tree. The rocks were matted with\\nsumachs and blackberry-bushes, and the place\\nwas said to be snaky yet it was lovely with\\nits tree and shrubbery and white flowers, and\\nwas always strewn, in fruit time, with broken\\ntwigs and forked sticks. The wild cherry is\\na prettier tree every way than the tame red.\\nIt is round-trunked, pyramidal, glossy-barked,\\nwith breezy, profuse, white blossoms and small\\nblack, graceful, clustered fruit, and it binds up\\nin its fibres rare, healing juices. Black-cherry\\ntrees often stand thick along old walls, unnoted\\nby the farmer until quite grown. They give to\\nthe rocks in spring a beauty which the sumach,\\nwith its crimson leaves, gives in autumn for\\na few days they outline a field with their pure,\\nwhite, pendulous blossoms. Their fruit looks\\ntoothsome, but is pungent and acrid; yet,\\nlike the wild apple, when plucked from the\\nsunny side of a tree, in field or pasture, it\\nwould not fail there to please you. E obody\\never plants wild cherry-trees, but they spring", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0174.jp2"}, "175": {"fulltext": "OLD TREES. 169\\nup freely in out-of-tlie-way places. Close by\\nfences and in rock lieaps, tliey easily escape\\nhostile ploughs, and thrust themselves pictu-\\nresquely out of the rubbish of a field into the\\nfeatures of a landscape. They are hardier and\\nless liable to disease than the garden species,\\nand the balsam which runs in their veins is not\\nof more worth than are their varied aspects\\nof beauty.\\nPlums were once raised with little care in\\nextreme ^N ew England. Peaches were also an\\ninfrequent growth. Black gum has nearly\\nkilled out the former severe winters the lat-\\nter. Like all later-maturing fruits, ripened\\nunder the slow processes of a N^ew England\\nsummer, the plums were pulpy, fine-grained,\\nand delicious. They are to be regretted, as\\nthe one thing which, in this bleak climate,\\nsimulated a tropical fervor. My grandfather s\\nhalf a dozen plum-trees, when last seen, were\\nblack, blighted, and unsightly; and the single\\npeach-tree had dwindled down to suckers,\\nsprung from the past winter s blight.\\nBut after all the tree which has best stood\\nwear and tear, which presents itself to me,\\nseeking for it, with the most familiar aspect,\\nis the butternut-tree by the well. No matter\\nhow rotten its core is, how ragged its branches,\\nI love its old a2:e even better than I did its\\n12", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0175.jp2"}, "176": {"fulltext": "170 S^EW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nyouth. ISText to that my heart goes out to the\\ntrees, spared hy the woodman s axe, in the\\nwoodland beyond the orchard. I saw a strong\\nman once crying like a child, because of the\\ncutting down of an old tree upon his lawn.\\nHe said all his children had played under it,\\nand it was a part of his life. I felt sorry for\\nhim, for his grief brought back to me the\\nmorning when I missed my great maple from\\nmy chamber window, and, looking out, saw it\\nlying, majestic but smitten, across my summer\\ngarden. Of all my trees I loved this one best.\\nIt had been cut down by mistake, and as it lay,\\nwith its leaves withering in the sunshine, it\\nseemed like a murdered thins:. It was lost\\nfrom my window; it was gone from the land-\\nscape it had been cruelly torn from the re-\\nmembered image of a dead child, this speech-\\nless yet speaking thing, which had grown into\\nmy heart.\\nTrees have their social aspect. Many have\\nbeen intimately known by me solitary trees,\\nand clumps of trees, and forests of trees, mem-\\norable by association. How you love to recall\\nthe trees which grew about your old home-\\nstead You were drawn to them by little\\nthings. In the forked branch of this you\\nwatched a bird s nest, out of the rotten trunk\\nof that grew a thrifty fern, here you perched", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0176.jp2"}, "177": {"fulltext": "OLD TREES. 171\\naloft, there you swung. In varied ways the\\nrugged old trees catered to your young de-\\nlights and wants, and grew beautiful and dear\\nto you. Trees were my childhood compan-\\nions, constant to me and I to them. I learned\\ntheir tricks of costume and ways of growth. I\\ncannot this day tell in what dress I loved them\\nbest whether in the tender green of spring,\\nthe deeper colors of later days, the crimson\\nand gold and russets of autumn, or the soft\\ngrays of the dying year. There were groups\\nof trees in pasture and lowland at my grand-\\nfather s, which are joys of memory, because of\\nrare shadings and colors which were cast upon\\nand overlapped into them by the passing of\\nthe seasons. There were four trees standing\\nin the middle of the rocky pasture whose inter-\\nlocked branches were unfolded, like the pages\\nof a richly-illuminated book, by the autumn\\nripening of their leaves. Standing by them-\\nselves, they were the most prominent things\\nto be seen, bright as flame in the sunshine.\\nThey were yearly emblazoned upon the gray\\npasture, and it was as if the condensed rich-\\nness and ripeness of the year had poured into\\nthem its old wine.\\nAll woods have their speech grim old\\nwoods, tangled and matted and solemn and\\ndark treacherous woods, wet and mossy and", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0177.jp2"}, "178": {"fulltext": "172 ^EW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nfall of pitfalls odorous woods, bright witli\\nferns and flowers and streaks of sunsliine.\\nLooking at painted forests, there are apt to\\ncome to me things never put upon canvas;\\nsuch as the sweet odor of a smoking, resinous\\nwood, caught at midnight from a burning\\nforest; a subtle, far-reaching, never-to-be-for-\\ngotten scent, the breath of dying pines. With\\nthe scent comes also a little cottage planted\\nagainst a savage background of blackened\\ntrees and smouldering sod, a weird forest night\\nscene, burned into a child s imagination. ]^o\\ncountry habitation could seem more alone\\nthan this house at midnight, close by the high-\\nway, in the heart of a forest, dimly disclosed\\nby moonlight, its lamps all out, its tenants\\nsleeping, so lonely, so fragile, so exposed, and\\nyet so peaceful, so strong, so safe, respected\\nby map s humanity, watched over by God s\\nprovidence.\\nOf all voices of the woods and the night,\\nthe low wail of the whippoorwill is the sad-\\ndest. It was a bird of ill omen to farmers\\nwives, and the woodland passed into evil re-\\npute because it was haunted by one. Any\\nsound thrust in a forest upon the silence of\\nnight is positive, and what would be unnoticed\\nin the daytime becomes a terror or a support\\nto the benighted traveller. The thud of liis", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0178.jp2"}, "179": {"fulltext": "OLD TREES. 173\\nhorse s hoofs and the rattle of his wheels do\\nnot shut out the slightest crackle of twigs, and\\nhe hears many strange sounds which he cannot\\ndisentano le from the darkness.\\nI hear, as if just passing it, on my way to\\nmy grandfather s, in the heart of the long\\nforest, the lapping of a pond at night upon its\\nshores. The horse shies at the waves and the\\ndriftwood, the wheels grind into the sand.\\nThe hridge at the outlet is said to be treach-\\nerous, and the outlet itself is sullen and dark.\\nIn the mile-away horizon the moonlight brings\\nout the one little cottage by the inlet, within\\na stone s throw of which its owner went down\\nthrough a treacherous breathing-hole, into\\nwhich he had driven from across the pond one\\ncold winter s night. My companion tells the\\nold story, and adds to it later accidents. Mean-\\nwhile we near the bridge and the inlet, which\\nseems to yawn to swallow us in. We urge\\nthe horse carefully, and he, with half-human\\ninstinct, plants his feet reluctantly upon the\\nbridge. It sags to one side, and the water\\nripples past the wheels. We hold our breaths\\nfor a minute, and then the passage is made.\\nIt was a foolish thing to do, but the risk gave\\nto me a remembered rare voice of a solitary\\nold wood.", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0179.jp2"}, "180": {"fulltext": "CHAPTEE XIII.\\nTHE DISTRICT SCHOOL.\\nSee the children as they used to come from\\nthe village school, a noisy little moh, ripe for\\nmischief. A wagoner drives along. The boys\\nswarm upon his cart like bees, tangled to-\\ngether and dangling behind with scarred and\\nmud-stained feet. The farmer either whips\\nbehind or leaves the struggling mass to dis-\\nentangle by a gradual dropping off. The chil-\\ndren who were left stop a moment. Poised,\\nexpectant, they all stand, until some foremost\\nfellow plunges his broad bare feet into the\\nhot, soft sand, scoops it along, and flings it\\naloft. Away they all rush, with a whoop\\nand a hurrah, ploughing along the road, half\\nsmothered by the dust they fling about them.\\nI^othing could be more charming than the\\ngroups of school-bound children in early sum-\\nmer mornings, simply clad, chattering like\\nmagpies, making the air ring with their\\nlaughter. Their prattle was mostly of flowers\\nand birds of the treasures of fields and pas-\\n174", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0180.jp2"}, "181": {"fulltext": "THE DISTRICT SCHOOL. 175\\ntures and woods, and their many little adven-\\ntures in their close dealings with nature. They\\nwere as hardy and untrained as the mullein\\nand hardhack and wild rose of the unploughed\\nroadside and they were as sweet to look upon\\nas were the blossoms of these weeds.\\nIn summer the scents of fields and woods\\nused to get into the school-rooms; especially\\nof the ferns, which sprang up all along the\\nstone walls, by the roadside, and in the damp,\\nshady corners of the fields. What country-\\nbred child does not remember these tender,\\ndainty roadside ferns which the children used\\nto stick in the seams of their desks, and\\ninto every available crack in the school-house\\nwalls Beds of them grew crisp in a field back\\nof the school-house in my grandfather s dis-\\ntrict, where the grass around them was above\\nthe heads of the smaller children. The man\\nwho owned this field was at war with the\\nscholars, for they would pluck the ferns, and\\nthe way to these led through his longest grass.\\nA wild cherry-tree stood in the centre of this\\nfield, and its ra2:2:ed wall was covered with\\nberry-bushes. When it was mowed scythes\\nwere tripped by hard-trodden trails, and the\\nold farmer was heard to say to his men one\\nsummer that the young cusses had cat up\\nhis field like a checker-board. He hacked up", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0181.jp2"}, "182": {"fulltext": "176 ^EW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nthe fern -bed 5 cut down the cherry-tree, and\\ntore up all the wayside berry-bushes. But\\ndear old Mother Nature outwitted him, and\\nthe next year the ferns came up again as rank\\nas ever strawberries and wild-fiowers grew\\nwhere the tree and bushes had been the eager\\nchildren made new trails after new things, and\\ncrisscrossed the field worse than ever.\\nThere was something delicious to the chil-\\ndren in their stolen marches upon this forbid-\\nden field. I see them now, leaping at recess\\npast the gap in the wall (that gap which would\\nnever stay mended) into their trails, neck\\ndeep in grass, tumbling and tripping as they\\nwent. Their faces are beautiful, framed in\\nmemory by the ferns and grains and grasses\\nof long since dead harvests they bring with\\nthem an Indian summer after-glow of senti-\\nment.\\nThe school -house yard was a sunny spot,\\ndefined by four flat corner-stones, good for the\\ngame of goal, crisscrossed by two hard- trod-\\nden paths, and littered by loose-lying sticks\\nand pebbles. Its stone wall was jagged,\\nthistle-lined, and much beset by bees. In the\\ncorner next to the school-house was an ever-\\npresent gap. You know how handy such\\nwall-holes used to be in your childhood how\\nyour bare feet clung to the smooth rocks,", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0182.jp2"}, "183": {"fulltext": "THE DISTRICT SCHOOL. 177\\nwhich had tumbled to the other side. You\\nhave doubtless yourself helped make them in\\npasture boundaries, or been the bruised vic-\\ntims of unpremeditated breaks. Nobody ever\\nseemed to know how this hole came. It was\\na school mystery, incessantly mended and as\\nincessantly undone.\\nClose by this gap was one corner of the goal-\\nground. The lively game of goal was played\\nby the girls at recess, the largest ones claiming\\nthe stones and right of way. They flew eagerly\\nfrom rock to rock, cheeks aglow and hair\\nstreaming. The smaller girls either watched\\nthem or strayed alongside forbidden fields for\\nwild forage. The game of goal was too tame\\nfor the boys, who, when their turn came,\\nrushed uproariously out, skimmed along the\\nwalls, tumbled with somers.aults into the fields,\\nhurrahed up and down the highways, irrespon-\\nsible, dirty, happy; seldom getting through\\nrecess without a free fight. The small boys\\nplayed marbles on the sunny door-steps, or ex-\\nchanged pocket treasures around the school-\\nhouse corner. When the teacher s knock put\\nan end to the uproar, they tumbled in as they\\nhad tumbled out, marvellously disentangling\\nat the threshold of the school-room.\\nThe teachers of the winter schools were a\\nmixed race. Well-educated farmers sometimes", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0183.jp2"}, "184": {"fulltext": "178 ^EW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\neked out tlieir incomes and. filled up their\\nwinter leisure by teaching school. Such were\\nalways savage disciplinarians. A hoy seemed\\nas tough of hide to them as Cherry and\\nBrindle, who drew their carts. They were\\nfertile in punishments and cruel with the\\nferule, green, birchen, supple ferule, used\\nfor the tingling and blistering of so many\\nouter integuments. These teachers were apt\\nto be nasal readers, but they were infallible in\\nspelling, geography, and book-keeping. They\\nwere not much given to oral instruction, but\\nfollowed one up closely in the multiplication\\ntable, abbreviations, and laws of punctuation.\\nThe village teachers were called masters and\\nmistresses, for many of them a fitting title,\\nmimic despots as they were. Often bright\\nyoung men, for the sake of the meagre pay,\\ntaught these schools. They were apt to have\\na hard time of it, and had to be strong of\\nmuscle and will not to get smoked out, or\\nunmercifully bothered by uncouth tricks. The\\nwinter schools were rough. Farmers boys,\\nfreed from work, many of them grown to\\nman s estate, flocked to them with slate and\\ncopy-book and text-books, to lay up that stock\\nof school learnino: which was to make them\\noracles in the village stores, moderators in\\ntown-meetings, and representatives to general", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0184.jp2"}, "185": {"fulltext": "THE DISTRICT SCHOOL. 179\\ncourts. They were difficult to manage puz-\\nzled the master with hard sums and knotty\\nquestions, and roared out their conceits like\\nyoung giants. They stamped through the\\nsnowy entries, shaggy-coated, puffing like en-\\ngines, ruhbing their frosty ears uncouth, yet\\nhonest, patient, and full of a rude humanity\\nworthy, hard-working farmers that were to be.\\nHere and there one different from the rest, a\\nqueer fellow, so called, drifted apart from\\nhis school-mates, so that, years after, they\\nwere wont to turn wearily from their ploughs\\nand boast that in boyhood they had mated with\\na famous man.\\nThe zeal of all of them was great after learn-\\ning. Their patience was pathetic. The dullest\\nof them hacked away at their books as dog-\\ngedly as they did in summer at the rocky soil.\\nPassing along the highway in winter even-\\nings, you might behold, through the exposed\\nwindows of farm-houses, young boys deep in\\ntheir tasks, by the light of tallow-candles and\\nopen fires; and it was pleasant to see the old\\nfolks watching them with a sweet pride, only\\nsurpassed by the conceit of the young learners.\\nThe books they used were few and seldom\\nchanged; but they seemed then to be good\\nenough, and the recitations from them were the\\nbest of their kind. These district schools were", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0185.jp2"}, "186": {"fulltext": "180 iV^ir ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nnurseries of talent and ambition. Their condi-\\ntions of severity and restriction have sent forth\\ngreat and famons men. The most laggard\\nscholars were yearly bettered by them, and the\\nbright ones got from their three or four winter\\nmonths of hard study as much as most boys\\nand girls get nowadays from nine months\\ntuition.\\nThe discarded books of these schools are\\noften found in the closets and garrets of old\\nfarm-houses, with their thick brown covers and\\nworm-eaten leaves. Their text is of quaint let-\\ntering, but their sense is unabated by time, and\\none feels tempted to go back to the use of these\\npotent things of the past, whose obsolete rules\\nhave taught so many wise men. Turning them\\nover and following them is like talking w^itli\\nfriends who, long ago, helped to make us what\\nwe are. Did you never, in later life, run across\\na reader (long since out of print) which w^as\\nused by the schools of your youth Its pages\\nseem as familiar to you as nursery rhymes, and\\nyou feel towards it as tenderly almost as if it\\nwere a human thing, this stilted old reader,\\nwhose solid literature was one of the stumbling-\\nblocks of your childhood. You have not for-\\ngotten its standard declamations and dialogues,\\nthrillingly rendered by loud-voiced boys and\\ngirls and the oft-repeating of its much prose", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0186.jp2"}, "187": {"fulltext": "THE DISTRICT SCHOOL. 181\\nand rhyme made you forever intimate with\\nthem. The names of men who made your\\nschool-hooks are househokl w^ords to you, and\\nwhen you woukl teach your chikh^en, your\\ntongue trips upon the rules which they taught\\nyou.\\nWhat unpenned literature is hound up in\\nbooks The stories printed on their pages are\\noften less pathetic, less tragic, than the real life\\nscenes which touch or sight of them can bring\\nback to you. I confess to an awe in handling\\nancient books, and follow their tender, mouldy\\npages as if I were in the presence of their past\\now^ners. The fading names upon their fly-\\nleaves have the helpless significance of all me-\\nmorials of the dead. There is a sad delight in\\nrummaging through an old library, in drag-\\nging out from corners and upper shelves vol-\\numes tucked aw^ay as Avorthless, but redeemed\\ninto preciousness by past use of them. Books\\nthat you used in your school-days, you curi-\\nously turn over for the marks you left in them.\\nGift-books, which have been thrust aside, are\\ntaken back, for the memory of him or her who\\nwrote upon their blank leaves pleasant mes-\\nsages. Guide-books and books that you read\\nupon journej^s thrust their titles upon you, and\\nset you again on your travels. Books once\\nread with friends quicken your memories of", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0187.jp2"}, "188": {"fulltext": "182 ^EW ENGL AND BYGONES.\\nsocial life. Books with strange names in\\ntliem, picked up from stalls, affect you like\\nhuman waifs; and ancient books, of quaint\\ndialect, like ghosts of the past. But before\\nall others are the books which never get tucked\\naway in corners those which were read last\\nby the loved and lost. How many have such,\\nwith marks left in; pencil touches; a stray\\nletter; names scrawled, pitifully meagre, un-\\nsatisfactory traces of hands which can never\\nagain turn them Take from me my books,\\nmost of them, if you will, but do not dare to\\ntouch the precious volumes in blue and gold\\nturned slowly over by the fingers of my dying\\nchild. They left no soil on the page, but their\\nsacred imprint is no less indelible to me. Dear\\nold books, all of you, no matter how much\\nyour printed leaves lie, the overlapping text,\\nlegible alone to faithful love, can never be\\nfalse You may grow mildewy and musty, but\\never tender and beautiful shall be the associa-\\ntions with which you are bound.\\nAncient school-houses were not built for\\ncomfort. Their seats were high and narrow,\\ntheir desks awkward and inconvenient. Their\\nchimneys were large, fireplaces broad and\\nsmoky, and the floors in front of them were\\nsure to be worn with the tramp of uneasily-\\nseated children, who in winter Avent up to", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0188.jp2"}, "189": {"fulltext": "THE DISTRICT SCHOOL. 183\\nthem in never-ending procession. The worst-\\nused place in the whole district was the school-\\nroom. Youngsters hewed and hacked at their\\ndesks with a revengeful persistence. The\\nplastering of the walls was covered with rude\\ninscriptions, and the ceiling overheard bespat-\\ntered with ink and paper squibs, l^o boy or\\ngirl ever plead guilty of any of these mars\\nand blots, but many additions went each term\\ninto the aggregate of this spontaneous fresco-\\ning. The old school-room in my grandfather s\\ndistrict was full of scrawls and names and\\nquaint maxims. Almost every teacher had his\\nor her profile in it, done in tolerable outline by\\nroguish fingers, l^o law had force against this\\ncustom. The scribbling of the school-room\\nhad become a second nature to the scholars,\\nand it seemed less culpable because the rough,\\nblotched walls upon near inspection resolved\\nthemselves into art exponents of child-life;\\nmade up of outline leaves and flowers and birds\\nand scraps of rhyme, crude pictures of what\\nhad gone into and out of the children s days.\\nThe marring of school-rooms thus, in one\\nsense, becomes their embellishment. The\\nnames, Avhittled indelibly into desk-lids and\\ndoor-posts, and all the traces of bygone child\\npossession, these are the true ghosts of\\nscholars and school-days that are past.", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0189.jp2"}, "190": {"fulltext": "184 NEW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nIn summer the rows of small, opposite win-\\ndows in old school houses, open upon the\\nchildren s necks, inured them to drafts; and\\nnothing could be purer than the breezes which\\nblew from every quarter of the heavens into\\nthese wide-opened rooms. In winter up the\\nbig chimneys went most of the heat, and with\\nit all the bad air whilst through cracks and\\nchinks w^ithout number blew the biting but\\nhealth-giving north wind. It was hard on\\nlittle boys and girls in corner-seats but then\\nthey were w^ell wrapped up in homespun suits,\\nand were always going to the fire to w^arm\\ntheir tingling fingers and toes. Every comer\\ninto the room let in a blast of cold air. At\\nrecess the bo^ s tumbled into the snow, and\\ncame back shakino- it from their o-arments.\\nTwo or three deep in a semicircle they hugged\\nthe fireplace, and sucked at snow-balls crushed\\nin their half-frozen fingers till the tap of the\\nmaster s ferule sent them unwillingly to their\\ndesks.\\nThe floor about the fireplaces was always\\nsopp} in w^inter with incoming snow^, and in\\nsummer w^as sure to be wet from slate-w^ash-\\nings and the careless upsetting of dippers.\\nClose by it, upon a low bench, stood the water-\\npail, the filling of which on summer days w^as\\na rare privilege to the older girls. The spring", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0190.jp2"}, "191": {"fulltext": "THE DISTRICT SCHOOL. 185\\nwas quite far away, close by the edge of a\\nwood. It was a pretty siglit to see tliem burst-\\ning into the school-room, staggering under\\ntheir load rosy, laughing, with their aprons\\nfall of flowers and mint from the brookside.\\nThe water of the spring had a snaky repute,\\nbut it was freely drank of by all the children,\\nand in various ways catered largely to their\\ncomfort and delight. On hot summer days\\nthe larger girls used to splash it about, and it\\nwould trickle down the aisles to scatter in\\ndust-bound globules over the dingy floor.\\nPeculiar, positive, and unlike any other,\\nwas at night the summer odor of these school-\\nrooms. The thick dust, ground fine by the\\ntramping of restless feet, elsewhere musty,\\nhere seemed to be scented with the withered\\nroses and ferns and mint left behind them by\\nthe half-wild children. Apple-cores, scraps\\nof paper, and bits of pencil were scattered\\nabout, and now and then the sweeper came\\nacross something from out the treasures of a\\nboy s pocket. The latter often in school-hours\\nfound a way to the floor, and got lodged in\\nthe teacher s desk. It was curious to look into\\nthe children s boxes, and see in them how mis-\\nchievous boys and girls had wliiled away the\\nlaggard hours; how many apples and ginger-\\ncakes had been slyly eaten, and cubby-houses\\n13", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0191.jp2"}, "192": {"fulltext": "186 ^E^V ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nbuilt from books, unbeknown to the teacher.\\nThe desk of the latter, fast locked, was always\\nfrao-rant with confiscated fruit.\\nThe aspect of one of these rooms after the\\nday s work was over was tenderly suggestive.\\nIt was a place out of which a jocund life had\\ngone, and the waste scattered around was\\nmade up of such things as the children had\\ngotten out of their stay in it. There was\\nsomething poetical in this leaving behind\\nthem the scents of the weeds and blossoms\\nwhich they had plucked, the fading memo-\\nrials of the delights of a day that had passed.\\nThe person who found solid comfort in the\\nwinter schools was that master wdio boarded\\nround in country districts, and tasted the\\ncream of kindness in farmers houses. He\\nsat in the best seat, in the corner, through w^in-\\nter evenings, book in hand, reserved, prim,\\nfeared, if not hated, by the youngsters. His\\npresence quickened the life of a household.\\nBest dishes were brought out, and dainties\\ncame upon the table. The fore room was\\nmost likely opened, and neighboring farmers\\ncame in of evenings to converse with this son\\nof learning. The housewife was more spruce\\nin her attire, and the children were fixed\\nup for the occasion. Some of these masters\\nwere like watch-dogs, and from their corner", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0192.jp2"}, "193": {"fulltext": "THE DISTRICT SCHOOL. 187\\nno covert sneer escaped tliem. The hard\\nschool usage of many a boy and girl dated\\nfrom dislike come of these transient tarryings.\\nThe summer school-mistresses, mostly farm-\\ners daughters, seldom brought much learning\\nto their tasks, but they were generally good-\\nnatured, and in favor with their scholars.\\nHard-worked mothers sent their younger chil-\\ndren to them as freely as if they had been\\nhired nurses, and the lower row of seats was\\nalways full of the druling, sleepy little things,\\nwith legs helplessly dangling. Patchwork and\\nsamplers were allowed in these schools, and\\ncurious pieces of their faded old needlework\\nare still to be found in country farm-houses.\\nThe securino of the summer schools was often\\no\\nthe cause of ill-feeling. Much canvassing was\\ndone, and committeemen were chosen with\\nreference to particular candidates, who went\\nbefore them to be examined in arithmetic,\\ngrammar, geography, and writing. The school\\npay was meagre, but a large item then to the\\ngirl of simple tastes and habits.\\nIt was astonishing how much the glory of\\nthe summer depended, to the children, upon\\nthe nature of the mistress. All the sunshine\\nthey got in their school-hours seemed to pass\\nthrough her; and by her disposition, as much\\nas by the book lessons she taught them, she", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0193.jp2"}, "194": {"fulltext": "188 NEW ENGL AND BYG ONES.\\ndid her work at moulding their characters. A\\ncross mistress turned their sweet into bitter,\\nand made the otherwise happy days long and\\nwearisome. The children took upon such\\ntheir natural revenges. They brought her no\\nflowers they lagged at their books, and with-\\ndrew from the aspect of the room much of its\\nwild summer adornments. But this was only\\na transient suppression outside they were the\\nsame romping, riotous, nature-loving children.\\nIf you have fortunately been one of these\\nschool-children, you recall the features and ac-\\ncidents of my picture, the low-roofed school-\\nhouse; its adjoining wood-shed, littered with\\nchips; the beaten play-ground; the outlying\\nfield, full of buttercups the wayside, thick with\\nthistle and mullein and hardback; the over-\\nhanging trees, the fallen fruit of which was\\nlawful plunder; the near wood; the far-oif\\nmountains the blue sky overhead the sun-\\nlight; the shadows; the moving life of the\\nscene. You see the traveller comins; down\\nthe thread of a highway on the distant hill\\nthe f^irmer s daughter spreading her clothes\\nto bleach in the orchard; working-men and\\noxen in the fields the shimmer of the near\\nstream. You hear the brook s babble and\\nthe hum of the insects the song of birds and\\nthe drowsy undertone of nature. You see and", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0194.jp2"}, "195": {"fulltext": "THE DISTRICT SCHOOL. 189\\nfeel it all, the onward processes of life the\\nunerring growth of the year; the resistless\\ntramp of time. Very much would you give to\\nleap back for a day upon the old goal-ground,\\nthat you might lie upon the grass, a scholar\\nand a dreamer, and again watch that narrow\\nlandscape, which grew into you with a fruitful\\nminuteness, and which has been the stable\\ngroundwork of the best landscapes of your\\nmaturer life.", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0195.jp2"}, "196": {"fulltext": "CHAPTER XIY.\\nAFTER THE SUMMER.\\nJocund country harvests blessed dying days\\nof the spent year, how delightful, seen from\\nan upland, was the exuberance of your finished\\nvegetation Farms were like gardens, with\\npatches of corn and later grain and clover and\\nsoft-tinted second grass. Orchards w^ere full\\nof apple heaps pumpkins and squashes dotted\\nthe fields; sumachs flaunted by the roadside\\nand outlined the walls forests were aflame\\nbushes kindled in field and pasture. The earth\\nwas alive with workers. The life of every\\nhousehold seemed to have poured itself out\\nupon the landscape, to wdiich, beyond the\\nbrightness given to it by the deep-dyed colors\\nof the perfected year, was added that after-glow\\nof the summer, which marks the true harvest\\ndays. These days are the richest of the year,\\nfor they hold its dying, its life, and its resur-\\nrection. They are full of its miracles. The\\nincoming season is pushing out the old and\\nthe husks which are thrust out in the process,\\n190", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0196.jp2"}, "197": {"fulltext": "AFTER THE SUMMER. 191\\nthe stubble of the cornfields, the withered vines\\nand weeds, the things that have been blighted\\nby frost, or sapped by the fruits which they\\nhave borne, lie thick on the brown earth. The\\nrefuse of the outsfone life and its incomino-\\nfruits are fused together in a sort of mellowed\\nglory, a final and transient burst of brightness\\nfrom the spent season, which is giving back to\\nthe farmer tenfold for his labors.\\nTo one driving at night through the country,\\nwhat can surpass its beauty, the offspring of\\nits devastation? Over all, fair and solemn and.\\nstately, watches the harvest moon. There is a\\ngray glitter to everything. Objects bristle in\\nthe clear, cold air. Shadows beset wood and\\nhighway, and lie upon rock and hillock and\\nfield and pasture. Shadows lurk in corners,\\nstalk before and stretch out behind. The whole\\nlandscape takes life. Trees and fences seem to\\nmove, and far-away objects play pranks with\\nyour horse. Every sound is crisp in this\\nnight air. The frisking of your little dog\\nthrough the wayside bushes snaps their twigs\\nlike the click of pistols. Anything stirring\\nin the wood, or out of it, sends an echo flying\\nover the resonant fields. Farm-houses and\\nbarns are brio;ht with harvest lis^hts. Distance\\nand moonlight lend charm to mild festivities,\\nand girls, seen from the highway, move and", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0197.jp2"}, "198": {"fulltext": "192 NEW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nwork amon2:st tlieir sheaves with a classic\\ngrace. If the doors of the barns are shut,\\nthen from cracks and crevices and gable win-\\ndows streams the ruddy light, and merry as\\nbells burst out the singing voices of young\\nmen and maidens. Their songs are mostly\\nquaint ballads, swelling full upon the night\\nair.\\nOne of these old barns was an attractive\\nplace, with its ceiling lofty and cob webbed, its\\ngable-windows far up and dusty and dim, its\\nwalls flanked on either side by solid mows of\\nsweet-smelling hay, which clung to the boards\\nand beams way up to the rafters. It was full\\nof the odor of the dried ferns and flowers that\\nhad been en tang-led and cut down with the\\ngrasses and ladders and working-tools, lean-\\ning against its mows, blended in beauty with\\nits many-shaded browns, as did every senseless\\nthing and dumb beast and living man within\\nits walls.\\nBehold an ancient husking-party, merry\\ngathering. The barn is dimly lighted by can-\\ndles in tin lanthorns, hung high on pegs. The\\nhomely structure sufters a night-change into\\na lofty hall, with arches and stained roof and\\nfretted beams. A new life seems to be born\\ninto the withered grass. It clings to and\\ntwines about the jagged wood with a fantastic", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0198.jp2"}, "199": {"fulltext": "AFTER THE SUMMER. 193\\ncarving. A whole year has gone into the mix-\\ning of the colors of this picture, in the sha-\\ndows of which sit the huskers of the corn\\nharvest. The brawny arms of young men and\\nthe plump arms of maidens keep time to their\\nmusic. Some are breaking the ears from the\\nstalk others are stripping the husks from the\\near, lightening their tasks with the babble of\\nflying tongues. Stout men bear brimful bas-\\nkets of golden ears to the granary heaps of\\ncast-off stacks are made compact crisp white\\nhusks pile up against the shoulders of the girls\\nand fly about their ears; cheeks grow red\\nand eyes brighten; spirits rise; jokes are\\ncracked pranks played and many a flirtation\\nplied with unconscious grace. The end comes\\nat length, the last basket is sent out, the husk-\\ning is over. The thrifty farmer, who has slyly\\nput back his clock and delayed his supper,\\nblows a horn, and just as the lanthorns begin\\nperhaps to wane, out from the barn burst the\\nrustic merrymakers, eager for the harmless\\nfestivities of farm-house parlor and kitchen.\\nThe supper is abundant, homely, and whole-\\nsome, and the huskers, with appetites sharp-\\nened by labor, partake heartily of it. The\\nhardy workers keep no late hours, and mid-\\nnio-ht finds the farm-house silent and deserted,\\nwhilst groups of merry youths send their", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0199.jp2"}, "200": {"fulltext": "194 ^EW ENGL A ND B YG ONES.\\ncliatter and laughter eclioing back from lane\\nand field.\\nOn the morrow the host will go out early to\\ninspect his granary, and make right any care-\\nless assorting of ears. The stalks will be\\nstowed away on highest mow for future feed.\\nIf kindly disposed, he will leave the ragged\\nbutts to be picked over by careful housewives.\\nHow forlorn these women looked, with shawls\\npinned over their heads, rummaging for white\\nhusks intent, silent, plying their task with\\nbare and sinewy arms, their wrinkled, care-\\nworn faces tanned by exposure, it was hard\\nto think of them as having once been rosy,\\nlaughing girls, handsome helpers at bygone\\nhuskings. They tramped along the highway\\nwith crowded baskets and bundles, satisfied,\\nand unconscious that in thus taking up the\\nfag-end of the harvest they were only gray\\nworkers and bearers of burdens. Their husks\\nmade sweet beds, and the mats they plaited\\nwere serviceable and cleanly.\\nBusy, prudent, working woman the same\\nthrift which has spread her joints and hard-\\nened her face has also helped to build her\\ncomfortable home. Here are the shining pans\\non the bench beside her; the kitchen-garden,\\njust beyond, alive with bees; the water-barrel,\\nhalf buried in sunflowers; the plantains and", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0200.jp2"}, "201": {"fulltext": "AFTER THE SUMMER. 195\\nburdocks tlie wood-pile, tossed about, with\\naxe and cliopping-block near it,\u00e2\u0080\u0094 all incidents\\nof a pleasant picture, for tliis is tbe back-\\ndoor of a farm-bouse, and this woman tbe\\nsimple housewife, whose walk in life is with\\nthese homely things.\\nShe was plump and fair and rosy-cheeked\\nonce. In childhood she roamed the fields and\\npastures, and went to the village school. As\\nshe grew older she had much heart in rustic\\nmerriment. She showed taste in dress and a\\nlove for flowers. A natural grace was born in\\nher. Something called gentility came to her,\\nso that the garments she wore fitted and became\\nher. She had her little romance, begun and\\nended at an apple-bee or husking. Dressed\\nin her prettiest frock, with a bright ribbon at\\nher throat, she was then most unlike this hard-\\nfaced woman standing by her door. Here\\nshe is a background to part of her belongings.\\nShe has burnished the pans, and weeded the\\ngarden, and dipped water from the barrel day\\nafter day. Suns have risen and set, years have\\nbegun and ended, and the wearisome cares\\nhave also come round in never-varying pro-\\ncession, until she has gotten to be what you\\nnow see her, a patient, faded worker,\u00e2\u0080\u0094 the\\nspinner and weaver and purveyor of a house-\\nhold.", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0201.jp2"}, "202": {"fulltext": "196 ^EW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nThese hand-maidens of nature, isolated from\\nart, unconsciously expressed much beauty in\\ntheir humble wares. The webs they wove were\\nunadulterated, pliant, and lustrous; their dyes,\\ndrawn from homely weeds, were rich and\\ntenacious; their polished bowls, scooped out\\nfrom knotted wood, were prettier than any\\nsilver plate; their flax- wheels were stringed\\ninstruments and many things of their daily\\nhandling were elegant for shape or color.\\nWho has ever seen a more pleasing sitting-\\nroom than that of many an old-fashioned\\ncountry-house, with its deep-toned homespun\\ncarpet, its dark mahogany, its tall clock in the\\ncorner, its narrow mantel, high up, filled with\\nsea-shells and a stray vase or two its low walls\\nits windows shaded by lilacs and overhang-\\ning elms? The brass knobs on drawers and\\ndoors, and in chimney-corners, were pleasant\\nspots of brightness. The brass-tipped, lion-\\nclawed table-legs were the best-made things\\nof their kind. The clock in the corner, with\\nits quaint machinery, its involved registering,\\nand its loud ticking, was the unlying chroni-\\ncler which was to last long after the family\\ndied, a thing beautiful for the richness of its\\nmaterial and the stately expression of its form.\\nA soft brown pervaded the room, which was\\nbrightened through its windows by more per-", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0202.jp2"}, "203": {"fulltext": "AFTER THE SUMMER. 197\\nfeet landscapes than could be bought for\\nmoney, perfumed by scents which no art\\ncould bind up for sale. The curtains and car-\\npets, the threads of which were dyed with\\nbarks and weeds, had the wild color of things\\nwhich had grown in fields and woods.\\nFarm-houses were busy as bee-hives in au-\\ntumn with the peculiar work of the season.\\nTheir sunny sides were hung with strings of\\nsliced apples and pumpkins; yards were lit-\\ntered with barrels and casks and loaded carts\\nsheds were crammed with the outpouring of\\nthe year. The women were eagerly taking\\nup the loose-lying threads of their work,\\nchopping, pickling, preserving, assorting their\\nbutter and cheese for the market, setting\\ntheir d^^es, and making their woollen webs\\ninto garments.\\nWhen the harvests had been gathered in,\\nthe mellow flavor of them seemed to pervade\\nthe whole house; and there was not a room\\nwhich was not in some way graced by the\\n])roducts of the past year. The garret was\\ncrammed, and the kitchen beams were hung\\nthick with earth-grown things strings of\\nbright peppers, bunches of herbs, long-necked\\nsquashes, braided seed-corn, and much else\\nprecious to the farmer, summer forage of his\\nfields. The most valued gifts of his farm were", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0203.jp2"}, "204": {"fulltext": "1 98 NE W ENGLAND B YG ONES.\\nkept here, in siglit and out of reach, the sa-\\ncred seedlings of the coming year. The cellar\\nbeneath was full of the fatness of the past\\nseason. From its bins came the odor of many\\nfield crops; out of casks and barrels the scent\\nof the year s vintage.\\nThe farmer is planted in his chimney-corner.\\nHis year s work is over, his harvest is gathered\\nin. Asleep by his hearth-stone, with the ruddy\\nfirelight dancing over him, he is a picture of\\ncalm content, an honest man, with few wants,\\nenriched by nature, and so made happy by her.\\nHis room is also fire-gilded into a place of rare\\ndelight. The fruits which he has by hard\\nlabor wrought out of the earth s bosom, strung\\nover and around him, cling like carved things\\nto the beams and walls so that, without know-\\ning it, this homely man sits, a life study, by\\nhis own hearth-stone.\\nWith the ending of the harvest peace seemed\\nto fall upon the farm-houses they were filled\\nwith the glow of blazing fires and the inturn-\\ning of the out-of-doors life. It was a simple,\\nsweet life. Memories of winter evenings spent\\nat my grandfather s come back to me. They\\nbring to me the glory of age, the simplest forms\\nof domestic life, and the beauty of winter\\nlandscapes. They give to me a perfect fire-\\nside picture in a quaintly-furnished room, in", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0204.jp2"}, "205": {"fulltext": "AFTER THE SUMMER. 199\\nthe cliimney-coriier of which sits an old man\\nwith flowing white hair, a beautiful old man.\\nOutside, to the fiir-aAvay horizon, stretches the\\nundulating, snow-covered landscape, on which,\\nin gray outline upon a white ground, one sees\\nmany beautiful things which were hidden by\\nthe verdure of summer many shapes which\\nhave been revealed by the dying of leaves and\\nirrass. Skeleton trees and bushes and naked\\nwoods seem to be thrust out in aerial mezzo-\\ntint soft, gray, and shadowy. The piercing\\nflrelight streams through the windows, and\\nstretches out and joins hands with the moon-\\nbeams, and goes dancing over field and pas-\\nture, even to the far-off hills.", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0205.jp2"}, "206": {"fulltext": "CHAPTEE XV.\\nWINTER PLEASURES.\\nIIow utterly transforming to the country is\\nthe first positive snow-fall of winter! It is a\\nthing of life it clings and hangs everywhere.\\nIts great, fluffy ridges and folds put out of\\nsight fences and rocks and hillocks and high-\\nways, and bleach the gray surface of the land-\\nscape into a dazzling whiteness. Under this\\nnew veneering the most untidy farm-houses\\nare beautiful, and the worst-tilled fields as\\ngood as the best. Waking up into such a\\nchange some winter morning is like going into\\na new world. It is coming out from the gray\\nmourning of the almost dead year into a sub-\\nlime white silence.\\nEvery country-born person can recall such\\ngreeting of an early snow, to meet which he\\nhas gone forth with elastic step and heart.\\nSlowly and picturesquely motion is thrust upon\\nthe scene. Walkers, scuffling through the\\nlight snow, trail slender paths along; smoke\\ncoils from chimneys; cattle are let into the\\n200", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0206.jp2"}, "207": {"fulltext": "WINTER PLEASURES. 201\\nsunny barnyards; life spills out from the farm-\\nhouses troughs are chopped free from ice\\nmen begin to hack at the wood-piles and draw\\nwater from the wells teams are harnessed\\nchildren start for school, the new landscape\\nis alive with workers, thrust out with startling\\ndistinctness from its snow background.\\nDirectly off from roofs and fences and rocks\\nand higher hillocks, with the sun s march, slips\\nthis snow covering, and from the beautiful,\\nevanescent picture arises another, with added\\nwarmth and life and color. To one drivins:\\nthrough a forest at such a time it is as if fairies\\nhad been at work and laden its minutest twists\\nwith a rare, white burden. Snow-clad old\\nwood, through which I passed years ago on\\nmy way to my grandfather s farm, you are as\\nlovely in memory as you were in reality then.\\nIt is earl}^ morning. The air seems to crackle\\nwith the magic of frostwork. Fleecy fringes\\nare fallins: from the overburdened branches\\nand fling over me great, foam-like flakes the\\nhorses hoofs sink deep and noiselessly. Foot-\\nprints of wild animals are thick in the wood,\\nand all along the wayside are tracks of squir-\\nrels, rabbits, and such harmless things. Loaded\\nteams grow frequent and sleighs fly past. The\\nsound of bells is crisp and loud. Betsy pricks\\nup her ears and flings out a spray-like cloud on\\n14", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0207.jp2"}, "208": {"fulltext": "202 NEW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\neither side. The little doo: following after\\nshoots over the wall, boundino; neck deep into\\nthe unbroken snow, sniffs at the tiny footmarks\\nof game, plunges into the wood, and I hear\\nhim barking shortly after far ahead. TAvigs\\nbegin to snap. There is a crackle through the\\nwood, the sun is climbing up, the snow is melt-\\nins:, and fallino- from the trees sinks with a\\nflufty sound into the cooler bed below. Sharp\\nand distinct is the voice of this dissolving pan-\\norama. As the sun gets power the snow gar-\\nment shrinks, and all of a sudden it glides off\\nfrom the grim old wood.\\nOften a mist or rain, coming upon the newly-\\nfallen snow, cr^ stallizes it into solid shapes,\\nand the sun gives to this frostwork a bewil-\\ndering beauty, l^othing could surpass my old\\nwood thus clad. It was a sublime, many-\\narched, crystal cathedral, outlined with flash-\\nins: brisfhtness. What a transient thins: it\\nwas As quickly as the sun gilded it, just so\\nquickly did it demolish it. Glittering pillar\\nand frieze and cornice suddenly disintegrated,\\nand under the gra}^ naked, old trees thick-\\nstrewn twists and fast-meltins: icicles were all\\nthat was left of this palace of carved ice.\\nIIow short the Avinter da^ S used to seem\\nhow clear-cut they were by snow and cold and\\nlack of growing life. A\\\\^hat winters those", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0208.jp2"}, "209": {"fulltext": "WINTER PLEASURES. 20\\no\\nwere of forty yenvs ago, when snow-drifts blot-\\nted out the features of a landscape and lev-\\nelled the country into a monotonous white\\nplain when people woke in the morning to\\nlind their windows blocked up, and the chief\\nlabor of months was to keep their roads open.\\nMuch joy the young people got out of these\\nsame snow-drifts. The crusts which hid the\\nfences gave them ample coasting-fields, and\\nthey burrowed like rabbits in the drifts. I re-\\nmember a village, beloved by Boreas, which\\nwas beset by mimic Laplanders, who used to\\ncall out to surprised travellers from their caves\\nin the piled-up wayside. In this same vihage\\nthe adventurous boy used to shoot over high-\\nway and fence, across fields, past a frozen\\nbrook, up to the edge of a forest a mile ofi^\\nHis small craft was liable to strand by the way,\\nand lucky was he if he did not bring up\\nagainst the jagged bark of some outstanding\\ntree. Ilis sled w^as home-made, of good wood,\\nmortised and pinned together, and shod with\\nsupple withes, wdiich with use took a polish\\nlike glass, and had seldom to be renewed.\\nBoys and girls slid and coasted through\\ntheir childhood, and this keen challenge of\\nthe north winds, this flinging of muscle against\\nthe rude forces of winter, shaped and strength-\\nened them for after-labor. Tlicy glided along", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0209.jp2"}, "210": {"fulltext": "204 NEW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nthe highway, over tlie ruts made by iron-shod\\nwood-sleds they guttered the snow-drifts with\\ntracks and wherever the rain had settled and\\nfrozen in the fields or hy the wayside, they\\ncleared and cut up the ponds with their swift\\nflying feet. Ploughing knee-deep through\\nfreshly- fallen snows to the village school,\\nroughly clad, rosy cheeked, joyous, they\\neagerly beset passing sleds and sleighs, hang-\\ning to stakes and clinging to runners, from\\nwhich they tumbled into the school-house en-\\ntry, stamping it full of snow. The girls were\\nnot a whit behind the boys in their clamor\\nand agility. They slid down the steep snow-\\nbanks and up and down the ice-paths, swift\\nand fearless, and burst into the school-room\\nalmost as riotously as the boys.\\nTea-drinkings were the usual social diver-\\nsions of the farm-house winter life. They\\nwere prim occasions, on which the best china,\\nlinen, and silver were brought out. Pound-\\ncake and pies and cheese and doughnuts and\\ncold meats were set forth, and guests partook\\nof them with appetites sharpened by the rarity\\nof the occasion. INTeighbors from miles away\\nAvere liable, on any fine winter s evening, to\\ndrive into my grandfather s yard for a social\\ncup of tea. The women took ott their w^aps,\\nsmoothed their cap-borders, and planted tliem-", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0210.jp2"}, "211": {"fulltext": "WINTER PLEASURES. 205\\nselves, knitting-work in hand, before the\\nhearth in the best room. The men put np\\ntheir horses, and coming back, they stamped\\ntheir feet furiously in the entry, and blustered\\ninto the sitting-room, filling it with frosty\\nnight-air. They talked of the weather, of the\\ncondition of their stock, of how the past year s\\ncrops held out, and told their plans for the\\ncoming year. The women gossiped of town\\naffairs, the minister, the storekeeper s latest\\npurchase, of their dairies, and webs, and lin-\\nens, and wools, keeping time with flying fin-\\ngers to the tales they told. The unconscious\\nold clock in the corner kept ticking away the\\nwhile, and Hannah, in the next room, set in\\norder the repast, to wdiich they did ample jus-\\ntice, growing more garrulous when inspired\\nby the fine flavor of hospitality. They came\\nand also went away early. When the outer\\ndoor and big gate had closed after them, there\\nhad also gone out with them all extra move-\\nment and bustle from the household. Every\\nspoon and fork and plate was already in its\\nplace, the remnants of the feast had disap-\\npeared, and the family was ready to take up\\non the morrow the slackened thread of its\\nworking ways.\\nThe leave-takings of these ancient hosts and\\nguests were simple and beautiful. They shook", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0211.jp2"}, "212": {"fulltext": "206 NEW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nhands and passed salutations and good wishes\\nwith as much gravity as if they had heen going\\nto some far land and the pleasure which the\\nvisitors avowed in the graciousness shown\\nthem was heartfelt. Merrily jingled their\\nhells from out the farm-yard into the high-\\nway, and softly dying out with distance, the\\nsound came hack from the far-oif hills in\\npleasant echo.\\nTender, true hospitality, simple customs,\\nrare entertainments, you left no sting, no\\nweariness hehind you. You gave and impov-\\nerished not. You were ungilded hut digni-\\nfied and decorous, healthful and pleasure-\\ngiving. If you were plain, you were not\\ninelegant, for your silver was pure, your\\nchina quaint and costly, your linens were\\nfine -twined, your viands were well cooked\\nand wholesome. You were simply served to\\nsimple guests, hut not without etiquette and\\nthe essence of style. The host carved with\\ndexterity, and the hostess, in her husy passes,\\nwas instinctively ohservant of the tastes and\\nneeds of her guests. That which garments\\nlacked in material and make, the ruddy fire-\\nlight imparted to them, painting these rohust\\nfarmers and matrons into rarely costumed\\npictures. What of high culture was wanting\\nto their speech, was given to it hy the sweet", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0212.jp2"}, "213": {"fulltext": "WINTER PLEASUPiES. 207\\npiety and purity of it. They talked of wliat\\nmade up their daily lives, and that was the\\nyearly marvels and glories of ever-dying ever-\\nrenewing nature. The men, discoursing of\\nwinds and rains and cattle and grasses and\\ntrees and grains, stumbled upon many truths\\nof high philosophy and, reviewing with earn-\\nest faith the sermons of the Sahbath-day,\\nshowed themselves well grounded in all gos-\\npel doctrine. The w^omen, innocently prat-\\ntling of the webs they w^ove, drawing in and\\nout the threads of much discourse, mixed with\\nit many a iine-spun sentiment, and the golden\\novershot of the few but keenly relished diver-\\nsions of their serious lives. The servinof-maid\\nand serving-man listening to them, and catch-\\ning the glow of the firelight past them, went\\ninto the background of the picture, to be\\nquaint creatures of remembered scenes. They\\nthemselves, observant and reverent of their\\nelders, felt the sweets of liospitality in their\\nown hearts; and in ministering generously\\nunto others were themselves being ministered\\nunto.\\nThe w^inter lull of vegetation was often spent\\nby my grandmother and Hannah in the spin-\\nning and dyeing and weaving of Avoollen fab-\\nrics, to be afterwards fashioned into quilts.\\nThe most esteemed of these were made of", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0213.jp2"}, "214": {"fulltext": "208 NEW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nglossy, dark flannel, lined with yellow, with a\\nslight wadding of carded wool. For such a\\nquilt the best fleece was set aside, and many\\ndyes steeped in the chimney-corner. Fastened\\nto a frame, it was in summer the fine needle-\\nwork of the house. Neighbors invited to tea\\nhelped to prick into it, stitch by stitch, the\\nshapes of flowers and leaves. They came early\\nand bent over it with grim zeal, helped on by\\nthe gradual showing of the pattern. They\\nloved to take out the pins and roll up the thing,\\ncounting its coils with delight. The quilting\\nof it was hard work, but the women called\\nthis rest, and were made happy by such simple\\nvariation of labor. They kept up their harm-\\nless babble until sundown, when one, more\\nanxious than the rest, catching sight of a re-\\nturning herd, would exclaim, The cows. are\\ncoming, and I must go. Shortly they might\\nall be seen hurrying hither and thither through\\ngreen lanes, back to the cares which they had\\nfor a few hours shifted.\\nThe finishing of this quilt made a gala day\\nfor the neighborhood. It was unrolled and\\ncut out with much excitement. When Hannah\\ntook it to the porch-door to shake it out, the\\nwomen all followed her, clutching its edges,\\nremarking upon the plumpness of the stitched\\nleaves, and the fineness of its texture. It was", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0214.jp2"}, "215": {"fulltext": "WINTER PLEASURES. 209\\ntruly a beautiful thing, for it was a growth of\\nthe farm, an expression of the life of its occu-\\npants, a fit covering for those who made it.\\nThe winter diversions of the young people\\nwere just as simple as those of their elders.\\nWhat could be quainter than the singing-school,\\nheld in a country school-house, with its rows\\nof tallow candles planted along the desks, and\\nits loud-voiced master pitching his tunes The\\nyoung men sat on one side and the maidens\\non the other. Its wdld music was heard far\\naway. The tunes sung were of long repute,\\nand what was wanting in melody and har-\\nmony w^as made up by the zeal with which\\nthey were roared out. To many of the singers\\nthe walk home was the best of all, when, in\\nundertone, they lengthened out the melodies\\nwhich had been taught them.\\nApple-bees and spelling-matches sometimes\\nbrought together the fathers and mothers of\\nthe district, as well as their sons and daugh-\\nters. The former were apt to mean frolics,\\nwhich carried more confusion than profit into\\na farmer^s kitchen. The latter were the occa-\\nsions of much healthy merriment.\\nAfter all, the true zest to these diversions\\nwas given to them by the bright moonlight,\\nwhich generally brought them to pass. It was\\na welcome comer, and turned the introverted", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0215.jp2"}, "216": {"fulltext": "210 NEW ENGLAND BYGONES.\\nevening life of the farm-liouses out into illu-\\nminated lanes and liigliways. Solemn liigli-\\nways on gray winter evenings one got easily\\nbewildered in them and thrown off from his\\ntrack. Objects loomed up out of the snow,\\nand harmless things took strange shapes and\\nlooked ghostly in distance and whiteness.\\nHorses were apt to shy, runners bounced Avith\\na sharp click upon the uneven path, and bells\\nrang sharply in the clear, cold air. Merry,\\nmerry bells, telling of coming and departing\\nguests, the one jocund voice of winter, putting\\nthe traveller in heart, making glad the listening\\near, ringing right joyously into farm lane and\\nyard, who does not welcome with delight the\\nold-time jingle The sound of country bells,\\nstruck out by the slow, measured pace of farm-\\nliorses, was of prolonged measure. It was\\ndeep, too, because the bells were made large\\nand of good metal. The peculiar sound of each\\nfarmer s bells became as much his personal\\npossession as his own voice, and they were\\nquite sure to last his lifetime. As much as the\\nwinds the bells gave voice to the season. It\\nwas joyous mostly, yet with a wild pathos in\\nits music when dying out in tortuous country\\nways, with that sad indistinctness of any sound\\nwhich has wellnigh passed into silence.\\nAkin to the bells for sweetness of cxpres-", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0216.jp2"}, "217": {"fulltext": "WINTER PLEASURrS 211\\nsion were the farm-liouse lights, starring the\\nlandscape and telling the traveller of peaceful\\nindoor life. Driving through the country, si-\\nlent with the rest of winter, one cannot over-\\nestimate the companionship and friendliness\\nof the lighted windows of outlying hahitations.\\nThe hreaking of a, farm-light upon your sight\\nis like the grasp of a living hand, and with it\\ncomes out to you the peace of firesides by it,\\nunawares, people send forth to you the warm\\nglow of hospitality. An unlighted house in\\nthe sparsely-settled country is most forlorn. It\\nis a body without a soul, a thing which ought\\nto be alive and is not.\\nIn the simplicity of ancient country life the\\nhomespun curtains were seldom let down at\\neventide. The farm-houses were mostly the\\nlength of a lane from the roadside, and so the\\npictures of their indoor life were sent out from\\ntheir small windows through a softened per-\\nspective. What could be better than the\\nwhite-headed old man dozing in one chim-\\nney-corner; the dear old grandmother nod-\\nding in the other; the middle-aged son and\\ndaughter resting over light work the back-\\nlog, getting ready for its raking up; the Avails,\\nhung with tokens of sleeping child-life, such as\\nslates, caps, and comforters, homely things,\\ncatching the light of dying embers", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0217.jp2"}, "218": {"fulltext": "212 ^BW ENGLAND B YG ONES.\\nHow bright the winter sunsets were, how\\nclear and starlit the nights, how bracing and\\nelectric the air, how much more generous than\\nharsh was that climate which, while it blotted\\nout vegetation, at the same time spread over\\nthe landscape a great spectacular glory\\nShut in by frostwork from sight of the out-\\nof-doors w^orld, have you never, when a child,\\nbreathed upon an icy pane and, through the\\nloophole thus made, caught a condensed view\\nof the glories of a winter s day\\nPicturesque upon snow were the most com-\\nmon movements of farm-life. Men, chopping\\nlogs, seemed more like players than workers.\\nWith what steady swing their axes rose and\\nfell how these glittered in the sunshine\\nThe chips that flew freely about, tilted at all\\nangles, how fresh they were, with their pret-\\ntily-marked lines of yearly growth, their\\nshaggy bark, and their scent of sap. The\\nsound of the axe was resonant and cheerv,\\nputting life into a farm-yard. It echoed still\\nmore pleasantly from a woodland, whence it\\ncame with a muffled indistinctness, like a\\nregular pulse-beat of labor. The choppers\\nseemed never to tire only they stopped now\\nand then to brandish their stiffened arms, and\\ngaze at their growing piles with thrifty pride.\\nThey wore mittens of blue and white, striped,", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0218.jp2"}, "219": {"fulltext": "WINTER PLEASURES. 213\\nor knit in a curious pattern, called chariot\\nwheels, by the housewives. Many of them\\nhad leathern patches upon thumb and palm.\\nHow contentedly the cattle stood chewing\\ntheir cuds and blinking their eyes looking\\naskance at the long icicles which hung from\\neaves of barns, and trickled drops upon their\\nbacks. Women came out with baskets and\\nbuckets for wood and water and, in the\\nsilent attitude of labor, paused for a moment\\nand basked in the sunshine. Wood-laden\\nsleds dragged along the highway, with bo^^s\\nand girls clinging to their stakes; and the\\nteamsters shouts to Broad and Cherry,\\nmingled with the chatter and laughter of boys\\nand girls. Roofs lazily drying, smoked in the\\nsunshine; and you heard the weather-wise\\nfarmer saying to his neighbor, It thaws in\\nthe sun to-day.\\nBeautiful was the heavily coiling smoke in\\nthe crisp, morning air. How deliciously its\\nopaque whiteness was piled against a back-\\nground of sky. What a charming aerial wel-\\ncome it was from the morning life of the farm-\\nhouse.\\nBeautiful was the fantastic piling of storm-\\nclouds, forerunners of winds; and beautiful\\nwere the rugged drifts made by flying snows.\\nllush I am young again. The homely", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0219.jp2"}, "220": {"fulltext": "214 NE W ENG LA ND B YG ONES.\\nscenes have all come back the old Avorkers\\ninto their old ways and pLaces, and the earth\\nthey deal with A\\\\ raps them about with its\\nsplendor. Snow King, grand old master, va-\\nriously carving out the features of a winter\\nlandscape, I salute you\\nDear dwellers in that old-fashioned home, I\\nsalute you also You seem to me in memory\\nas stately and as beautiful as one of the tall\\noaks of your own possessions. ISTature was\\nyour godmother. She led you in childhood\\nthrough her fields and pastures and wood-\\nlands. She distilled for you the best balsams\\nof her trees and shrubs. You unwittingly\\nquaffed them as you went with her, and they\\ngave you health and strength and lease of a\\nlong life. Tliey inoculated you with a taste\\nfor pure pleasures. Your frames, your man-\\nners, your desires, your Avhole life, had a flavor\\nof the land that bore you. You were the true\\noutgrowth, the real aborigines, the rightful,\\nharmonious, delightful denizens of the soil,\\nyou long-dead, but never-to-be-forgotten\\ndwellers in mv 2:randfather s home\\nTHE END.", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0220.jp2"}, "221": {"fulltext": "", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0221.jp2"}, "222": {"fulltext": "", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0222.jp2"}, "223": {"fulltext": "", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0223.jp2"}, "224": {"fulltext": "", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0224.jp2"}, "225": {"fulltext": "o", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0225.jp2"}, "226": {"fulltext": "", "height": "3257", "width": "2115", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0226.jp2"}, "227": {"fulltext": "", "height": "3216", "width": "2081", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0227.jp2"}, "228": {"fulltext": "", "height": "3332", "width": "2184", "jp2-path": "newenglandbygone00roll_0228.jp2"}}