Demorraliz: Wald,
Bellefonte, Pa., Sept. 23,1904.
SADDETS OF THE YEAR.
When the plaintive winds are soughing o'er
the worn and faded lea, 3
And thick the leaves are falling from each and
every tree ;
When the crafty politician goes a-fishing after
votes,
And you smell the smell of camphor in the dug
up overcoats :
When mosquito screens have disappeared, and
on the toothsome butter
The sportive fly no longer strolls and make
you bad words u tter—
Then no presaging soothsayer needs to whisper
in your ear
That the melancholy days have come, the sad-
dest of the year.
AS A THAW 1IN THE SPRING,
Evelyn Brennon looked about the room
with timid eyes. From babyhood she ‘had
been afraid of something within and with-
out herself while in this room. She did
not analyze her fear; she knew neither the
word analyze nor its meaning, nor did she
give much thought to her feelings in the
matter. The room was not an unusual
one; every house for miles around had its
‘‘Parlor,’’ a recom pretty much like the one
where Evelyn stood. An ingrain carpet of
red and green blocks was on the floor, pro-
tected from the boards by a thick interlay-
er of straw that crunched under each foot-
step. Six cane-seated chairs s$ood primly
against the walls. The family Bible of im-
itation morocco and much gilt lettering,
out-lined by a tidy of insistent white, lay
on a highly varnished centre-table that
stood to a hair’s-breadth exactly in the
middle of the room. Life-size ‘‘crayon’’
portraits in cheap gilt frames hung on the
walls—walls covered with paper design of
huge red roses and many green vines
against a yellow background.
One other frame held a wreath, its leaves
and flowers made from the hair cnt from
the head of each dead relative on both sides
of the family. Evelyn knew from whose
head each little strand of hair had come,
and its story of life and of death. She look-
ed at it undisturbed; it was to her neither
grotesque nor tragic—just a hair wreath
that filled a space between two windows.
She pulled down the shades, smoothed
the tidy on the table a bit, and went into
the sitting-room with a relieved feeling that
“the parlor was cleaned and done with for
another two weeks. The homeliness of
the sitbing-room with its hright rag-carpes,
its worn chairs, its sewing-machine, its
work-basket, and everywhere the reflected
touch of human contact, broukht a reactive
glow to her heart. She breathed joyfully,
and went into the clean, shining Kitchen
with a liséle hamming rhythm on her lips.
Tall and straight, she had the firm flesh
and beauteous glow of health. Her blue
eyes had sparkle, her lips redness. She
was young, and the blood went through
ber veins with the bound of youth.
‘*Evie,’’ her father’s voice broke in on
her hamming song, “I’m goin’ to town this
afternoon, and you’d hest knock up a quick
dinner.”’
‘‘Yes, pa,’’ she said simply.
He stood a moment as though in hesita-
tion, then turned to the wash-basin and be-
gan to wash his hands. He was a man of
sixty-five, short and stout, his whiskers and
hair of a yellowish gray, his eyes yet blue
in color, with a knowing shrewdness and
homor. In religion, a Baptist, but Jonas
Brennon in or out of it; ‘‘bonest,”’ his
neighborhood called him, ‘‘but close, very
close.”
Evelyn had dinner on the table before he
came downstairs. She wondered a little at
the length of time it took him ‘‘to clean
himself up a bit.”” and wondered more at
his going to town on ‘‘market-day.’’ Tues-
day, Thursday and Saturday were ‘‘mar-
ket-days’’; on those days the covered wag-
on was filled with produce from the farm
and taken to town, where with the other
market wagons, it was backed up to the
curbing of Dayton’s public square, its con-
tents displayed on an improvised table of
boards set on the sidewalk. Evelyn’s great
days were those on which she went with
her father to market. She enjoyed the five-
miles drive to town in the early morning
hours, the meeting the other market-men
on the way, the friendly greetings inter-
changed. The taking from the wagon the
boards and legs of which the table was
made, the placing thereon of crisp vegeta-
bles, pats of butter, baskets of eggs, dress-
ed poultry, jars of jam and marmalade—all
this was a joy. But the great joy was in
being a part of the crowd; the people who
scld and the people who bought were the
moving features of a great drama. and she
was one of them !
Her fresh young face in its plain ging-
ham bonnet, smiling in joyous content, was
a picture that caught many a buyer. When
some of the market-women, orabhed and
assertive, told of the mean traits of their
customers, Evelyn always wondered why
it was that ber buyers were all so pleasant
and so easily pleased.
As she waited dinner she thought regret-
fully that her days of going to market were
over; she was now the woman of the house,
and was needed at home more than at the
market-staud. Her revery was broken by
the entrauce of her father. Her eyes open-
en wide as they fell npon him; he had pus
on his boiled shirt, and best black suis,
clothes that he wore only at weddings and
faverals—even for church on Sandays they
were deemed t00 precious.
He ate his dinner in silence, and in si-
lence Evelyn waited upon him. She watoh-
ed him climb into bis boggy and take np
the lines, watohed him eagerly, but said no
word—she had been taught not speak to
her elders till she was spoken to.
He tucked the linen duster about him,
fidgetted a little, looked her in the eye,
then away again quickly, and said :
‘I'm goin’ to bring someone out with
me; you'd better have (ried chicken and
short-cake for supper. We’ve been pretty
lonesome here, Evie.
in your ma’s place.
ried to-day an’ things’ll be cheerier now.”
_ He had reached the road and was out of
sight before she moved. Like a thing:
stricken she made her way into the house.
Someone in mother’s place, and mother
dead for three months ! She dropped into
a chair and stretched her strong young arms
across a table and stared dambly ahead.
The plain, hard mother with her eoono-
my and thrift, her exactions of obedience,
her meagrely shown affections, had in life
been feared as much as loved. They bad
been mother aud child, never comrades.
The distance that dogma and tradition pre-
scribed between parent and child bad nev-
er been lessened by the arrow, rigid moth-
er.”
knew, and the girl’s stunted sense of love
had hungered forno more, * Throygh deatly
. Alie bad hécome nearer to Evelyn than in
*, like; the gil then realized fully how much
her. mother had: meant to her, and dimly,
J er, suffered for her, bled for her.
We need someone
I’m going to be mar-’
She had given as'she could and as she
bow much the might have meant had they
understood something, she could not name
bos grasp, bus that stirred easily within
er.
Iv was that “‘something’’ that cried out
loudly now. The bratality shown toward
herself in this early remarriage did not pre-
sent itself; she thought only of her moth-
Mother
—and treated in such manner. Faithful
wife—and replaced so soon !
‘‘So soon’’ was the shaft which so sorely
wounded her. She had expected her fath-
er to marry again, and had he waited a
year—the circumspect length of time in
that community—she might even have
welcomed a woman’s presence in the house.
Now, she could only accept it; and in such
bitterness of spirit as she had never known
before. Her grief over her mother’s death
had been tempered by submission toa high-
er will. In this new grief were humilia-
tion, disgust; outraged womanhood.
Straight and tense she stood in the door-
way as her father drove in with the woman
who was to take her mother’s place. She
watched with hard, dry eyes as Jonas,
chuckling and beaming, lifted out the new
wife and led ber stratsingly to where his
daughter stood. :
‘‘Here’s your new ma, Evie,”’ said he.
“Jennie, this is Evelyn, an’ she’s a good
girl, too. You’n’ her’ll get along spank-
in?”
‘‘Sapper’ll be ready by the time you get
your things off,”” was Evelyn's greeting,
and tarning abruptly, she went into the
house.
The fried chicken and shori-cake were
all they should be, but only Jonas did jus-
tice to their merits; the women ate but lit-
tle. Jonas was not easily upset. He ate
with the relish of robust hunger, looking
with boastful pride at both his wife and his
daughter. The good looks of the women
folks tickled his vanity. That he had
cause for pride was proven by the fact that
each woman was silently acknowledging
the good looks of the other. The older
woman with passive regres for her own lost
youth, the younger with increased bitter-
ness agaiast the woman who sat in her
mother’s place and dared to be fairer than
that mother had been.
The second Mrs. Brennon was a woman
of sixty, with abundant gray hair, waved
and becomingly coiled. Her eyes were
brown, soft and bright, and her cheeks
were plump and ruddy. Her body was
plump, and while'her shoulders rounded a
little, she carried her head proudly alers.
Her clothes became her, but they were
dressier than Evelyn thought a woman of
her age should wear. Still, she was far
different from what Evelyn expected her to
be, and in the three days following, her bit-
terness lost itself somewhat in wonder. She
could not see how it was that snch a wom-
an could marry a man whose wife was but
three months dead.
On the fourth day after dinner as Jonas
was leaving the kitchen Mrs. Brennon
said:
“I want to go to town this afternoon,
Mr. Brennon, to do some shopping. You
had better give me the money before you
go, and hitch the horse and tie is to the
post; we won’t disturb you then at your
work. Evelyn will go with me. I want
her to help select the things.”
‘‘Money, eh ?”’ he. said, smiling bhenig-
nantly, and handed her a two-dollar bill.”
She looked at it a moment, then at him.
‘‘You misunderstood me, I guess,’”’ she
said, laughing. ‘‘This shopping is to buy
things to fix the house. You remember
we talked this over before we were mar-
ried. I will need $wo hundred dollars.
Evelyn went swiftly into the sitting-
room and closed the door behind her. With
a gasp she covered her face with her hands.
Ounce on a market-day she had watched a
man walk Shoslipk-wire, watched him with
dilating eyes sill he reached the middle of
the wire, then a sudden fear had seized her,
and, covering her eyes, she had waited in
terrorized agony for the shouts of the crowd
to tell her it was over. She was waiting
now till it was over. Two hundred dol-
lars ! [Little creepy shivers chased up. and
down her back. - For the time being, bitter-
ness and wonder merged in pity; pity for
the woman’s disappointment, not only now
but always, pity for her father. Would he
know what to say, what todo? Would he
not think he bad lost his senses, or the
woman had lost hers, or—or something
wild and calamitous? She shivered again
and waited. Mrs. Brennon’s voice, speak-
ing calmly, aroused her.
‘If yon will show me where the things
go, Evelyn, I'll clear the table and help
with thedishes; from now on I'll take the
brunt of things. Your pa’s right, there’s
too much work here for your young shoul-
ders. I wanted first to see the farm.
Hereafter when he talks about this or that
lot I'll know what he means.”’
Evelyn turned slowly and looked with
dazed eyes at the woman’s cheery face.
She was in a maze as she washed the dishes,
and all the way to town her hig blue eyes
looked out from under her little straw hat
with the blue ribbons plastered down prim-
ly, with bewildered appeal.
As purchase after purchase was made it
dawned upon her that the new wife had nos
only bad the temerity to ask for the two
hundred dollars,—but had obtained it!
She no longer tried to think things out—it
bad passed beyond her powers of fensoning.
Besides, the purchases were abso/bing her
attention ; wall-paper, carpets, pictures,
easy-chairs, a bookcase, a dining-table, and
so on, until her mind was benumbed under
successive shocks.
As they drove home the woman did the
talking.
“It’s good to be in the country again,’
she said, heartily. ‘When one’s been born
and raised in the country and lived there
for fifty years it ain’t living, somehow, to
be cooped up in a little 35-by-100 foos lot,
with no garden and hardly room to hang
out a washing decent. I’ve lived in Day-
ton now ten years, ever since Mr. Beards-
ley died, aud to save my life I can’t get
used to buying little dabe of vegetables and
drinking thin milk.” }
.Evelyn’s eyes opened wide,a little gleam
of sympathy creeping in;3he had not dream-
‘ed that her stepmother was a countrywom-
an.
‘We'll he pretty busy now for a few
weeks, getting things fixed up,’’ Mrs. Bren-
nou continued. ‘‘I’m going to havea porch
built on the east side of the house, right off
the front room, so we’ll have a shady place
to sit afternoons. I never stay indoors a
minute if 1 can be out. After some of the
trees are cut down on that side it'll give
us a good view of the railroad and the rail-
road tracks. We'll get your pa right away
at fixing up things outside, and we'll fix
inside.”’
The girl’s heart thumped with joy; to
have the trees cut so that she could see the
road ! To have a porch tosit on afternoons
and watch the teams go by ! Suddenly her
joy died ous, her lips set in a hard, straight
line. Yes; it would be done for this wom-
an: Her own mother had sat on the back
porch and when she wanted to see the road.
or the railroad tracks she-had to walk. the
fall length of the yard and. hang. over the
bars of the fence !: are
‘*Your pa thinks too much of earning
mouey and not enough of enjoying. We'll
have to show him there’s more profit in
spending money the .ighs way shan io sav-
ing it the wrong way. Men mostly are
close, though. Mr. Beardsley used to grum-
ble a heap at what he called my high-falut-
in’ notions. He liked it, though. They
always do.”” Her smile was knowing.
‘‘Have you many beaux, dear ?’’ she asked
with natural interest. .
Evelyn reddened. ‘‘I haven’t any,’”’ she
answerer, stiffly. ‘‘I don’t want any.”’
The woman iaughed pleasantly.
‘‘You think you don’t dear, but you
wouldn’t be a natural girl if you didn’t. I
wouldn’t have missed the beaux out of my
life for a good deal. There’s nothing else
in the world just like it. Nature knows
pretty much what she’s about. A man
who doesn’s like a woman ain’t very much
of a man to my notion, and an old maid is,
I verily believe, .an abomination to the
Lord. I think Panl was disappointed in
love and it soured him on marriage, or else
he wouldn’t have written what he did
against it. For swo people who love each
other living together is just the fulfilment
of heaven. You must bave a beau, Eve-
lyn; it goes against the grain with me to
see a pretty young woman who hasu’s a
man to love her. There's just no joy can
beat the little fluttering and fixing for him |
and the waiting to hear his voice. A wom-
an who hasn’t had that has missed a heap,
I can tell you.”
Evelyn did not answer, bus her face slow-
ly brightened. As they drove through
their gateway it dawned in upon her that
she had listened so intently to this wom-
an’s talk that she had forgotten where she
was. She hated herself for her interest.
Her bright look faded, her red lips took on
a hard expression.
During the next four weeks the dreary
parlor was transformed into a cheery sit-
ting-room, and the one-time sitting-room
was turned into a dining-room. And .Jo-
nas, who at first stously declared that the
kitchen was good enough for anyone to eat
in, was as pleased with the new order of
things as a boy with his first hag of mar-
bles. Grumbling, but secretly chuckling,
he changed his sweaty shirt in the evenings
for a olean one, and at meals pus on the al-
paca coat Mrs. Brennon had bought for the
purpose. His whole talk at market, at
church, or wherever he could find a listen-
er, was to brag of the ‘‘old lady’’ and her
*‘doin’s.’’ His hearers laughed and said,
‘No fool like an old fool,” but Evelyn
knew that be had good cause for his happi-
ness. The new wife had brought new life
into the place. Then she was so cheerful;
and while she could pitch in and work with
the best of them she always managed things
so that she had plentyof time to take things
easy and to go to places.
And she always took Evelyn! Yet there
could be no real good, the girl reasoned
stubbornly, in a woman who set her moth-
er’s memory at naught; who came into her
home and took away every mark of the pa-
tient, plodding wife and mother. She
didn’t care if this woman did fix things np
and make things lively, she had no busi-
ness to be there, she had no right no make
ber father happier than her own mother had
made him. Well, be could like her if he
wanted to, but she would nos.” No—no,
would, would not.
And Mrs. Brennon, with her ready hands
aud pleasant way, went steadily ahead fix-
ing up the house and the grounds nncon-
scions of Evelyn's resentment. Despite
herself the girl was secretly overjoyed.
When her own room was changed from a
place to sleep in, with hideously papered
wall and bequilted bed, to a room made
actually beautiful with a few bolts of wall
paper, a few yards of white swiss, and some
cans of white paint, Evelyn’s eyes opened
wide in astonishment, and a sudden com-
punction swept over her.
She undressed herself that night with
hurried, trembling fingers, not once look-
ing around at the dainty, pretty fixings,
but keeping her eyes fixed firmly on the
stern young face that looked back as her
solemnly in the little ewiss-draped mirror.
Her step-mother’s comfortable voice, ber
father’s happy chuckle, came distinctly to
her ears as they passed her room.
‘No, Jonas,’ said Mis. Brennon, in arg-
umentative voice, “I’m not through yet;
I want some new clothes for Evelyn. She'll
only be young once. She’s too quiet and
moping-like for a young girl.”
Evelyn blew ont the light quickly and
jumped into bed. ‘‘New clothes for Eve-
lyn! Her heart was all of a flutter. Too
quiet and moping-like.”’ Her teeth came
together with a clinch. If it were not for
her she would be lively enough. Did her
step-mother think she was always like this?
Before this woman came she had been hap-
py and light-hearted, If she bad not come
—the girl sprang up and stood by the side
of her. bed. The moonlight streamed in
and made the room almost as light as by
day. She crept softly to the bureau and
rubbed her fingers caressingly over its new-
ly painted surface, touched lingeringly the
swiss scarf and beruffled pin-cushion, fin-
gered lovingly the soft muslin curtains and
fresh white shades. She knelt by the win-
dow and looked out at the roof of the new
porch, at the sweep of cleared ground that
gave a view—oh, joyous sight !—of the road
and railroad tracks. In strange panting
fright she olasped her hands tightly over
her heart. What—what if she had not
come?
She crawled into bed again and lay there
shaking from head to foot with an awful
fear. It was no use pretending any longer.
She was glad this woman had come. She
liked her—lik&d her—liked her ! No. No.
She loved her, loved her better than she
had ever loved her own mother. It was oot
—the terrible guilty truth. . She drew the
covers over her face, held them tightly in
her clenched, trembling fingers. Could
even God forgive such wickedness? She
tried to pray. The words would not come.
Never in all her life had she been so des-
perately wicked. What if God should vis-
it His wrath upon her? He bad said thou
shait have uo other gods before Me. Would
He—could He, that jealous God, under-
stand her love for this woman who was no
kin to her, whom she had never seen till
eight weeks before ?
Her tongue lay dry to ‘the roof of her
mouth, her shaking limbs grew heavy with
fear. Yet—yet—yet—she was glad—glad
this woman had come. The tense fingers
relaxed slowly; fearfully she peeped out
over the covers at the daintily draped win-
dows, the dressed-up furniture, the little
pink roses that scrambled over each, other
on the creamy ground af the wall-paper.
And as quickly she closed her eyes against
them. *‘Vengeance is mine, IT will repay,”’
thundered in her ears.
The days that followed alternated with
joy and fear. Tradition and the natural
emotion of her heart battled fiercely. Even
a new pale blue-lawn dress and a pretty
girlish hat did not lighten her trouble. The
girl’s listless figure, the dull eyes, the pale
tightly drawn lips worried Mrs. Brennon
considerably. She ‘dosed her with her blood
medicine and blue mass: pills; and insisted
on Jonas taking the girl to market; with,
him. At these times it was all Evelyn
could do to keep from throwing her arms
around her step-mother’s neck and crying
ous how much she loved her.
But tradition is strong, and Evelyn was
of the fibre that martyrs are made of. She
went resolutely every day to her mother’s
grave over in the back orchard and laid a
bunch of flowers there. And this nearness
to the stern. narrow woman who had borne
her kept Evelyn in the shadow of the rigid
hard discipline she bad been raised under.
She bad no way of knowing that the poor
mother had been narrow and cramped, and
stern in her dull years of life because tra-
dision bad laid its band on her, too. The
oold, dead lips could not cry out to the
flesh of her flesh, and bone of her bone,
that she had only existed because she did
not know how to live, that her poor, cramp-
ed soul had shriveled up because it had not
known how to expand.
Wearily the girl dragged herself away
from she dull shadowed spot back to the
bright, cheerful farm-house with its neatly
kept grounds and new air of homeliness,
filled with emotions, that she, poor child !
could not urderstand. And there was no
one to tell her, vo one to lift the burden of
guilt from the young bleeding heart, no one
to scatter the mists fiom the girlish mind,
no one to whisper that joy needs no excuse
for being. :
Her step-mother, busy, complacent, had
no experience of her own to help her un-
derstand what ailed the girl. That she was
moping she saw at once, and tried in every
way to brighten her up. She made Jonas
let her ose the new huggy, and coaxed and
bullied him into getting her all sorts of
girlish gewgaws; a string of beads, side
combs set with brilliants, a pair of open-
work silk mits, a fan with spangles pasted
on gauze, a white silk parasol !
Evelyn’s delight over these things was
unbounded. It made Mrs. Brennon feel
good all over juss to watch the dimpling
face and the bubbling joy of Ler.a:she open-
ed the bandles and saw the precious
things.
Bus still she moped.
‘‘Evie must have a beau.” It was in
determined voice that Mrs. Brennon made
this announcement to Jonas as they sat one
evening alone on the new porch.
Jonas took a fresh chew and crossed the
other leg.
‘George Black used to hang around here,
but Liddy an’ Jane Black didn’t jest gee.
Jane’s a spankin’ good cook an’ Liddy an’
her bad a falling out over some cakes they
showed at the Fair. Evie held up for
Liddy, an’ George stuck by his ma, of
course, an’ him an’ Evie ain’t see each oth-
er to speak to sence, as I know on. I ain’
never tasted sech pumpkin pies as Jane
Black’s. Liddy wouldn’t ask her for the
receipt. Liddy was awful sot in some
things.”’ :
Next morning Mrs. Brennou hitched the
horse to the new buggy and drove over to
Jane Black’s, three miles farther up the
pike. She settled herself comfortably on
Jane's side porch.
*“There ain’t much need of an introduoc-
tion,”” she said with hearty pleasantry.
‘‘I’ve been trying to get over here before,
but I’ve been so busy fixing things that
I’ve not had time to return visits,let alone
make ’em. And I ain’t come visiting this
time. I’m a fair cook myself, but Jonas
has talked so much about your pumpkin
pies, I’ve decided I’ve got a few things to
learn yet. I'd like your receipt, if it ain’t
asking too much.”’ +
Mis, Black’s wrinkled, weather-beaten
face relaxed into lines almost soft and
youthful.
‘‘Askin’ too much! Why, Mrs. Bren-
non, you’re welcome to it, an’ anything I
have. I know, though, it ain’t any bet-
ter'n yourn. Men jest get notions ’bout
things. Jonas always did talk a heap
Habout my pumpkin pies. Too much,’’ she
added, significantly.
Mrs. Brennon nodded her understanding.
‘She had no intention of discussing the first
Mrs. Brennon. She had not come for thas.
Just then George came in from the field;
perhaps he thought the dinner-gong bad
sounded, perhaps be saw the Brennon rig
drive in the gateway, perhaps he expected
to find someone else beside the pleasant
faced matron on the porch. The latter was
the reason Mrs. Brennon gave as she saw
him look slyly about and his face suddenly
fall.
A big, fine-looking young fellow with
good, alert face and merry eyes, he won
Mrs. Brennon’s heart at once. She greeted
him beartily. They talked about the
orops and the weather and the pests that
plague a farmer almost to death, bot both
were thinking as bard as could be about
‘‘Evie,’’ and somehow each divined what
was in the other’smind. = By the time Mrs.
Black came in with the receipt, George
knew the second Mrs. Brennon better than
he bad ever known the first one.
He gave her a waggish twinkle over his
mother’s head as she renewed the discus-
sion of the merits of Jane’s pies, and a
grateful smile as she insisted on their com-
ing over to supper the very next evening.
Jonas amiled, too, then gave a low chuckle
as Mis. Brennon, at dinner, told about her
visit and the arrangements made for the fol-
lowing day. Evelyn’s face went red, then
white, and all that day and the next she
was very quiet; qaiet but not moping, her
step-mother noted with keen satisfaction.
She herself helped her into the new blue
lawn dress, tied the long ribbon sash, and
arranged the soft hair so as to best show off
the new side-comhs. And very sweet aud.
winsome she looked as she stood shyly be-
hind her step-mother and greeted their
visitors.
The supper of fried chicken, hot biscuits,
crisp cucumbers and tomatoes, plump peas
and flaky mashed potatoes, golden-brown
coffee, and pumpkin pies made from the
famous receipt, was one, that to use Jane
Black’s own words, ‘‘couldn’t be beat.’’
Jonas sat at the table, twinkling and brist-
ling with good humor, and George Black
laughed till the tears ran down his cheeks
at Jonas’s jokes and yarns. The women
laughed, too, and got in occasional jokes of
their own that like Jonas’s had stood them
in good stead many a time before. Evelyn
was the only quiet one; like a shy, trem-
bling little bird she sat, content with the
‘wonderful lays that came from her joyous,
fast-beating heart.
Bus after supper she was strangely afraid
and hovered near her step-mother all the
while. Mrs. Brennon looked unseeingly
at the man’s rueful face, and not ’til near-
ly time for their visitors to go did she lend
him a hand. They were sitting on the new
porch, looking off down the road that
showed olear and white in the moonlight,
Evelyn sitting silent between her step-
mother and Jane, and George listening
dumbly to Jonas’s calculations on the win-
ter price of hay.
“I declare if I ain’t left my Paisley shawl
down ob the corn-bin in the barn I’ ex-
claimed Mrs. Brennon, in a sharp, annoyed
voice.! .‘‘I am that careless ! Evie, dear,
just tun: down and get it this very min-
ute—I set a heap by that shawl. 1t was
mother’s,’”’ and she plunged into a recital
of the numerous accidents that had be-
fallen she priceless heir-loom,
Evelyn went almost: on a run, and they
were nearly to the barn before George had
said a word ; then he canghs her in bis big
strony arms and kissed determinedly the
soft, flushed face aud Ghildishly quivering
lips.
“Next to you, Evie, she’s the best wom-
an in the world,” was what he said.
*“Wasn’s it funny how she kuew ?”’ she
breathed, rapturously.
*‘Knew what, Evie ?”’
teasing, happy voice.
‘“Thas I love youn,’’ che answered, oh so
softly and innocently. Her lover bowed
his head bumbly against the sweet up-
turned face.
“I'll be good to yeu, Evie,’”’ he said
huoskily. -“*I swear it, sweetheart.”’
She smiled joyously, and understood nos
at all the humility of the man before her
purity and childish truss.
be whispered in
Mrs. Black had ber honnet on ready to |J
start long before they came back, and, for
all the thought they had given it, the
precious Paisley shawl might still have
been on the corn-bin, had it not lain safely
all the while on its own shelf in Mrs.
Brennon’s clothes-closet.
Side by side, step-mothe:r and daughter
watched their company drive away, watch-
ed til the buggy was lost to view in the
shadows in the distance. Then the older
woman turned slowly.
‘‘He’s a fine young man,’’ she said, more
to herself than to the girl.
With a tempestuous, breathless little
ery, Evelyn threw her arms around her
Step-mother's neck, kissed her, clung to
er.
‘‘I—I bated you at first,”’ she cried, iv a
sharp, sobbing voice.
The woman patted the soft cheek, her
eyes moist and very, very loving.—By
Maravene Kennedy, in Everybody's Maga-
zine. :
York’s Evangelist Prophet Heard From.
A dispatch from York, Pa., says that
Lee Spangler, the York prophet and evan-
gelist, whose many predictions pertaining
to world events have been fulfilled, and
who prophesied the breaking out of the
war in the East a year before its occurrence,
the death of Queen Victoria, the assassina-
tion of William McKinley and the death
of Mark Hanna, is out with a fresh fore-
cast, which is given as follows :
‘In my last forecast several months ago,
I. predicted a great drought in Europe,
which has visited Germany. People won-
der why so many of my predictions are ful-
filled. There is nothing marvelous ahout
it. They are simply revelations from a
power higher than that of man. I have
been chosen as the medinm through which
they are to be made known to the people.
*I still reaffirm my prediction of the
election of Theodore Roosevelt as President
of the United States.
‘The war in the East is turning ont as I
said it wonld before its outbreak. Russia
is being defeated. Its power is broken and
it will never be a world’s power again.
God has avenged the wholesale butchery of
his people, the Jews, in Russia.
‘‘He has vengeance to visit upon other
far Eastern nations. Turkey will become
involved in war with other nations and
will be dismembered, the murder of thou-
sands of Armenians and other innocent
Christians will be avenged by God.
‘All the nations of Europe will decline
in power, with the exception of Eogland.
England and the United States will be
roling the Western world and Japan the
Eastern world when the destruction comes
in 1908. :
“*The greatness of President Roosevelt is
not realized by the people of the United
States. He has been chosen by God to do
a greater work than any other American
has performed. It would not be wise for
me to tell what this work:is.
‘A great drought is shortly to visit parts
of this country. I conld make other start-
ling prophecies, but God bas forbidden me
to give them to the people until later.”
If a credulous public can be led to be-
lieve such rot as Evangelist Spangler’s
above predictions are, at least in part, then
they are gifted with a greater amount of
superstition than is generally accredited
the American people. When election day
rolls around the York prophet will see just
how far off he was on his guess as to the
re-election of President Roosevelt.
The New Diocese.
Regarding the proposed division of the
Diocese of Central Pennsylvania of the
Protestant Episcopal church, the secretary
has completed a statement at the request of
Bishop Talbot. The new diocese will be
composed of Harrieburg and Williamsport
archdeaconries, embracing the following
counties:
Potter, Tioga, Clinton, Lycoming, Sul-
livan, Centre, Union, Northumberland,
Montour, Columbia, Blair, Huntingdon,
Mifflin, Soyder, Juniata, Perry, Cumber-
land, Dauphin, Bedford, Fulton, Frank-
lin, Adams, York and Lancaster.
The old diocese will have an endow-
ment of $46,473.16; the new diocese will
have one of $22,997.63. The income from
interest
$4,685,64, while that for the new will be
$3,855.06. © The total expenses will be
$7,475 for the old and $5,275 for the new.
This will require the diocese to raise $2,-
489.36 and $1,415.94, additional, respec-
tively.
The estimated revenue from increased
assessments will be $2,150 for the old and
$1,440 for the new, the assessment at
these rates being lower than in other
dioceses making proportionate assess-
ments.
The strength of the new diocese will be
greater than many others. The new
diocese will bave 7,887 communicants,
more than thirty-four other dioceses in
different-parts of the country. The num-
ber in the old will be 11,031, or more
than thirty-nine other dioceses have in-
dividually.
Filty-five clergymen will serve in the
new diocese and seventy-one in the old,
making the former stronger than
thirty-two others and the latter stronger
thirty - seven.. The new diocese will
have seventy parishes. ‘The old will have
eighty-five. These will give them a
strength proportionately greater than
many others, while the endowment funds
will also be larger.
Pointed Paragraphs.
Self-love is preferable to self-neglect.
Art at best can only turn out a poor
counterfeit of nature. }
Some men’s idea of progress is to stand
and watch others go backward.
It requires a lot of nerve to tell some
men the things they ought to know.
After striving for the almighty dollar
many a man strives to get rid of it.
One trouble with most of our modern
thoughts is that they were original with the
ancient thinkers.
It you want a large bill for: your small
change all you have to do ie consult a law-
yer or a dootor.— Chicago News.
and assessments for the old’
nment.
You may be sare that people who are al-
ways complaining of their environment, —
of the conditions which sarround them,--
for the evident purpose of excumsing their
inaction, mediocre work, or failure, are nos
organized for success. 'L'bey lack some-
thing, and the something, as a rule, is an
inclination to do downright, persistens
bard work. They are better at finding ex-
cuses for their failure than at anything
else. .
The man who expects to get on in the
world cannot do it with a half-hears, but
must grasp his opportunity with vigor,
and fling himself with all Lis might into
his vocation. No young man can flirt with
the goodness of success and succeed. If he
does not mean business, he will gnickly be
jilted.
In this electrical age of sharp competi-
tion, no young man can hope to get on who
does not throw his whole soul into what
he is doing. Great achievement is won by
doing, doing, doing, and doing over again ;
by repeating, repeating, and repeating
over again ; by finding one’s bent and
sticking to that line of work early and
late, year in and year out, persistently and
determinedly.
There is no half way aboutit. No one
can succeed by taking hold of his occupa-
tion with his finger-tips. He must grasp
the situation with all the vigor of his being,
with all the energy he can muster, and
stick and bang and dig and save. This is
the cost of worthy achievement, and there
is no lower price. There are no bargains
on the success counter. There is but one
price,—take it or leave it. You simply
waste your time if you banter.
What a pitiable sight it is to see a strong,
vigorous, well educated young man, in
this age of opportunity such as the world
never saw before, sitting around wasting
his precious years, throwing away golden
opportunities, simply because he dces not
happen to be placed just where he thinks
the great chances are, or does not see an
opportunity which is big enough to match
his ambition or his ability.”
It is a cruel, wicked sight to see our
wealthy young man squandering the hard-
earned fortunes of their fathers in vicious
living, bus what shall we say of a vigorous
youth with giant energiesand good educa-
tion, who folds his arms and refuses to
seize the golden opportunities all ahous
him ?
Bishop Spaulding, in a recent address,
said : ‘‘Success lies in never tiring of do-
ing, in repeating, and never ceasing to re-
peat ; in toiling, in waiting, in bearing,
and in observing ; in watching and ex-
perimenting, in falling back on oneself by
reflection, burning the thought over and
over,round and about the mind and vision,
acting again and again upon is,-.-this is
the law of growth. The seoret is to do, to
do now ; not to look away at all.
*“That is the great illusion and delusion
—--that we look away to what life will be
to us in ten years or in twenty years; we
look to other surroundings. It is nothing,
the environment is nothing ; or, in other
words, it is not possible to work except in
the actual environment. If you do nos
work where you are, where will you work ?
If you do not work now, when will you
work? There is nothing for us but here
and now.”’—Ez.
Jefferson a True Christian.
There cannot be the slightest doubt of
Jefferson’s reverence and sincerity and his
confidence in the efficacy of faith in the
highest abstract religious ideal. He be-
lieved that Jesus was a man on earth,
‘‘sanctified,’’ of superior wisdom and given
to charity, even to the sacrifice of His life
for the sake of mankind.
Indeed, the whole Jefferson Bible is
nothing lers than a collection of passages
from the New Testament that go to des-
oribe the incidents of the Saviour’s life and
repeat His utterances.
In the first part of the book, now in
press, there is a letter to a friend, Dr.
Benjamin Rush, in which he says :
‘My views, that result from a life of in-
quiry and reflection, are very different from
the anti-Christian system imputed to me
by those who do not known my opinions.
To the corruptions of humanity I am in-
deed opposed, but not the genuine precepts
of Jesus himself.
‘‘I am a Christian in the only sense in
which He wished anyone to be ; sincerely
attached to His doctrine in preference to
all others and ascribing to Him all buman
excellence, believing that He never claimed
to be any other.
‘“The philosophers were really great in
teaching the government of passions, which,
unrestrained, would disturb the tran-
quillity of the mind, bus they were defeo-
sive and short in developing the duties to
others.
‘‘The moral doctrines of Jesus relating
to love of the neighbor were more pureand
perfect than have ever been taught, since.
‘‘He was meek, patient, firm disinter-
ested, benevolent and of the sublimes$
eloquence.
‘‘The course of His preaching, which
lasted about three years, did not present
occasion for developing a complete system
of morals. The doctines which He really
did preach were defective, on a whole, and
fragments only of what Hedid deliver have
come down to us mutilated, misstated and
often unintelligible. Still more have they
heen corrupted by schiematizing followers,
who have found an interest in perverting
the simple doctrines He taught by engraft-
ing on them the mysticisms of a Grecian
Sophist (Plato), and frittering them into
subtleties or obscuring them with jargon
until they have caused good men to turn
away in disguss.”’
Prince Herbert Bismarck Dead at
Friedrichsruhe,
Prince Herbert Bismarck, ton of the
late Chancellor of the German Empire, died
Sunday morning at 10:15 o'clock. The
end was painless.
Since he ceased to be Foreign Minister
on the retirement of his father in 1890,
Prince Herbert Bismarck bad taken part
in public affairs only as a member of the
Reichstag. His attitude has been that of
a man not appreciated by his sovereign and
who was waiting in the background for an
opportunity to 1esmme his career.
Prince Herbert leaves five children, two
girls and three boys. His brother, William,
bad four children, all of whom are still
alive. The Countess von Rentzau has no
children.
The title of Prince Bismarck and the
large fortune of the deceased will go to his
7-year-old son, Otto.
The late Emperor Frederick gave to
Chancellor Bismarck extensive forests at
Friedrichsruhe which bave since increased
in valne. and the chancellor gave to Prince
Herbert $2,400.000 in securities and cash.
The estate is now estimated to be worth
$4,000,000, exclusive of -the lands.
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