"'THANK THE LORD! NOW I CAN SEE TO LOOK FOR 'EM!'"

MORIAH'S MOURNING

and Other Half-Hour Sketches

By

RUTH McENERY STUART

Author of "In Simpkinsville","A Golden Wedding" etc.

WITH ILLUSTRATIONS

LONDON AND NEW YORK
HARPER & BROTHERS PUBLISHERS
1898

Copyright, 1898, by Harper & Brothers.
All rights reserved.

Printed in New York, U.S.A.

CONTENTS

PAGE

• MORIAH'S MOURNING3
• AN OPTICAL DILEMMA19
• THE SECOND MRS. SLIMM37
• APOLLO BELVEDERE. A CHRISTMAS EPISODE OF THE PLANTATION53
• NEAREST OF KIN (ON THE PLANTATION)71
• THE DEACON'S MEDICINE93
• TWO GENTLEMEN OF LEISURE113
• THE REV. JORDAN WHITE'S THREE GLANCES131
• LADY. A MONOLOGUE OF THE COW-PEN157
• A PULPIT ORATOR165
• AN EASTER SYMBOL. A MONOLOGUE OF THE PLANTATION175
• CHRISTMAS AT THE TRIMBLES'181
• A MINOR CHORD211

ILLUSTRATIONS

• "'THANK THE LORD! NOW I CAN SEE TO LOOK FOR 'EM!'"Frontispiece
• "A SURPRISED AND SMILING MAN WAS SITTING AT HER
  POLISHED KITCHEN TABLE"Facing p. 8
• "'I'M AC-CHILLY MOST AFEERD TO SEE
  YOU CONVERTED'"Facing p. 40
• "'I PROMISED HIM I'D PUT ON MO'NIN' FOR HER
  SOON AS I MARRIED INTO DE FAMILY'"Facing p. 74
• "SAYS SHE, 'OPEN YORE MOUTH!' AN' OF CO'SE
  I OPENED IT"Facing p. 98
• "I DES LETS 'EM LOOSE P'OMISKYUS, TELL
  EV'YBODY SEE BLUE LIGHTNIN'"Facing p. 134
• "SALVATION'S KYAR IS MOVIN'!"Facing p. 148
• "'WON'T YER, PLEASE, SIR, SPELL DAT WORD
  OUT FUR ME SLOW?'"Facing p. 168

MORIAH'S MOURNING

Moriah was a widow of a month, and when she announced her intention of marrying again, the plantation held its breath. Then it roared with laughter.

Not because of the short period of her mourning was the news so incredible. But by a most exceptional mourning Moriah had put herself upon record as the most inconsolable of widows.

So prompt a readjustment of life under similar conditions was by no means unprecedented in colored circles.

The rules governing the wearing of the mourning garb are by no means stringent in plantation communities, and the widow who for reasons of economy or convenience sees fit to wear out her colored garments during her working hours is not held to account for so doing if she appear at all public functions clad in such weeds as she may find available. It is not even needful, indeed, that her supreme effort should attain any definite standard. Anybody can collect a few black things, and there is often an added pathos in the very incongruity of some of the mourning toilettes that pass up the aisles of the colored churches.

Was not the soul of artlessness expressed in the first mourning of a certain young widow, for instance, who sewed upon her blue gown all the black trimming she could collect, declaring that she "would 'a' dyed de frock th'oo an' th'oo 'cep'n' it would 'a' swunked it up too much"? And perhaps her sympathetic companions were quite as naïve as she, for, as they aided her in these first hasty stitches, they poured upon her wounded spirit the healing oil of full and sympathetic approval, as the following remarks will testify.

"Dat frock mo'ns all right, now de black bows is on it."

"You kin put any colored frock in mo'nin' 'cep'n' a red one. Sew black on red, an' it laughs in yo' face."

"I'm a-sewin' de black fringe on de josey, Sis Jones, 'case fringe hit mo'ns a heap mo'nfuler 'n ribbon do."

Needless to say, a license so full and free as this found fine expression in a field of flowering weeds quite rare and beautiful to see.

Moriah had proven herself in many ways an exceptional person even before the occasion of her bereavement, and in this, contrary to all precedent, she had rashly cast her every garment into the dye-pot, sparing not even so much as her underwear.

Moriah was herself as black as a total eclipse, tall, angular, and imposing, and as she strode down the road, clad in the sombre vestments of sorrow, she was so noble an expression of her own idea that as a simple embodiment of dignified surrender to grief she commanded respect.

The plantation folk were profoundly impressed, for it had soon become known that her black garb was not merely a thing of the surface.

"Moriah sho' does mo'n for Numa. She mo'ns f'om de skin out." Such was popular comment, although it is said that one practical sister, to whom this "inward mo'nin'" had little meaning, ventured so far as to protest against it.

"Sis Moriah," she said, timidly, as she sat waiting while Moriah dressed for church—"Sis Moriah, look ter me like you'd be 'feerd dem black shimmies 'd draw out some sort o' tetter on yo' skin," to which bit of friendly warning Moriah had responded, with a groan, and in a voice that was almost sepulchral in its awful solemnity, "When I mo'n I mo'n!"

Perhaps an idea of the unusual presence of this great black woman may be conveyed by the fact that when she said, as she was wont to do in speaking of her own name, "I'm named Moriah—after a Bible mountain," there seemed a sort of fitness in the name and in the juxtaposition neither the sacred eminence or the woman suffered a loss of dignity.

And this woman it was who, after eight years of respectable wifehood and but four weeks of mourning her lost mate, calmly announced that she was to be married again.

The man of her choice—I use the expression advisedly—was a neighbor whom she had always known, a widower whose bereavement was of three months' longer standing than her own.

The courtship must have been brief and to the point, for it was positively known that he and his fiancée had met but three times in the interval when the banns were published.

He had been engaged to whitewash the kitchen in which she had pursued her vocation as cook for the writer's family.

The whitewashing was done in a single morning, but a second coating was found necessary, and it is said by one of her fellow-servants, who professes to have overheard the remark, that while Pete was putting the finishing-touches to the bit of chimney back of her stove, Moriah, who stooped at the oven door beside him, basting a roast turkey, lifted up her stately head and said, archly, breaking her mourning record for the first time by a gleaming display of ivory and coral as she spoke,

"Who'd 'a' thought you'd come into my kitchen to do yo' secon' co'tin', Pete?"

At which, so says our informant, the whitewash brush fell from the delighted artisan's hands, and in a shorter time than is consumed in the telling, a surprised and smiling man was sitting at her polished kitchen table chatting cosily with his mourning hostess, while she served him with giblets and gravy and rice and potatoes "an' coffee b'iled expressly."

"A SURPRISED AND SMILING MAN WAS SITTING AT HER POLISHED KITCHEN TABLE"

It was discovered that the kitchen walls needed a third coating. This took an entire day, "because," so said Pete, "de third coat, hit takes mo' time to soak in."

And then came the announcement. Moriah herself, apparently in nowise embarrassed by its burden, bore the news to us on the following morning. There was no visible change of front in her bearing as she presented herself—no abatement of her mourning.

"Mis' Gladys," she said, simply, "I come ter give you notice dat I gwine take fo' days off, startin' nex' Sunday."

"I hope you are not in any new trouble, Moriah?" I said, sympathetically.

"Well, I don' know ef I is or not. Me an' Pete Pointdexter, we done talked it over, an' we come ter de conclusion ter marry."

I turned and looked at the woman—at her black garments, her still serious expression. Surely my hearing was playing me false. But catching my unspoken protest, she had already begun to explain.

"Dey ain't no onrespec' ter de dead, Mis' Gladys, in marryin'," she began. "De onrespec' is in de carryin's on folks does when dey marry. Pete an' me, we 'low ter have eve'ything quiet an' solemncholy—an' pay all due respects—right an' left. Of co'se Pete's chillen stands up fur dey mammy, an' dey don't take no stock in him ma'yin' ag'in. But Ca'line she been dead long enough—mos' six mont's—countin' fo' weeks ter de mont'. An' as fur me, I done 'ranged ter have eve'ything did ter show respec's ter Numa." (Numa was her deceased husband.) "De organ-player he gwine march us in chu'ch by de same march he played fur Numa's fun'al, an' look like dat in itse'f is enough ter show de world dat I ain't forgot Numa. An', tell de trufe, Mis' Gladys, ef Numa was ter rise up f'om his grave, I'd sen' Pete a-flyin' so fast you could sen' eggs to market on his coat tail.

"You see, de trouble is I done had my eye on Pete's chillen ever sence dey mammy died, an' ef dey ever was a set o' onery, low-down, sassy, no-'count little niggers dat need takin' in hand by a able-bodied step-mammy, dey a-waitin' fur me right yonder in Pete's cabin. My hand has des nachelly itched to take aholt o' dat crowd many a day—an' ever sence I buried Numa of co'se I see de way was open. An' des as soon as I felt like I could bring myse'f to it, I—well—Dey warn't no use losin' time, an' so I tol' you, missy, dat de kitchen need' white-washin'."

"And so you sent for him—and proposed to him, did you?"

"P'opose to who, Mis' Gladys? I'd see Pete in de sinkin' swamp 'fo' I'd p'opose to him!"

"Then how did you manage it, pray?"

"G'way, Mis' Gladys! Any wide-awake widder 'oman dat kin get a widder man whar he can't he'p but see her move round at her work for two days hand-runnin', an' can't mesmerize him so's he'll ax her to marry him—Um—hm! I'd ondertake ter do dat, even ef I warn't no cook; but wid seasonin's an' flavors to he'p me—Law, chile! dey warn't no yearthly 'scape fur dem chillen!

"I would 'a' waited," she added, presently—"I would 'a' waited a reas'nable time, 'cep'n dat Pete started gwine ter chu'ch, an' you know yo'se'f, missy, when a well-favored widder man go ter seek consolation f'om de pulpit, he's might' ap' ter find it in de congergation."

As I sat listening to her quiet exposition of her scheme, it seemed monstrous.

"And so, Moriah," I spoke now with a ring of real severity in my voice—"and so you are going to marry a man that you confess you don't care for, just for the sake of getting control of his children? I wouldn't have believed it of you."

"Well—partly, missy." She smiled a little now for the first time. "Partly on dat account, an' partly on his'n. Pete's wife Ca'line, she was a good 'oman, but she was mighty puny an' peevish; an' besides dat, she was one o' deze heah naggers, an' Pete is allus had a purty hard pull, an' I lay out ter give him a better chance. Eve'y bit o' whitewashin' he'd git ter do 'roun' town, Ca'line she'd swaller it in medicine. But she was a good 'oman, Ca'line was. Heap o' deze heah naggers is good 'omans! Co'se I don't say I loves Pete, but I looks ter come roun' ter 'im in time. Ef I didn't, I wouldn't have him."

"And how about his loving you?"

"Oh, Mis' Gladys, you is so searching!" She chuckled. "Co'se he say he loves me already better'n he love Ca'line, but of co'se a widder man he feels obleeged ter talk dat-a-way. An' ef he didn't have the manners ter say it, I wouldn't have him, to save his life; but ef he meant it, I'd despise him. After Ca'line lovin' de groun' he tread fur nine long yeahs, he ain't got no right ter love no 'oman better'n he love her des 'caze he's a-projec'in' ter git married to 'er. But of co'se, Mis' Gladys, I ca'culates ter outstrip Ca'line in co'se o' time. Ef I couldn't do dat—an' she in 'er grave—an' me a cook—I wouldn't count myse'f much. An' den, time I outstrips her an' git him over, heart an' soul, I'll know it by de signs."

"Why will you know it more than you know it now? He can but swear it to you."

"Oh no, missy. When de rock bottom of a man's heart warms to a 'oman, he eases off f'om swearin' 'bout it. Deze heah men wha' swear so much, dey swear des as much ter convince deyselves as dey does ter ketch a 'oman's ear. No, missy. Time I got him heart an' soul, I looks for him to commence to th'ow up Ca'line's ways ter me. Heap of 'em does dat des ter ease dey own consciences an' pacify a dead 'oman's ghost. Dat's de way a man nachelly do. But he won't faze me, so long as I holds de fort! An' fur de chillen, co'se quick as I gits 'em broke in I'll see dat dey won't miss Ca'line none. Dat little teether, I done tol' Pete ter fetch her over ter me right away. Time I doctors her wid proper teas, an' washes her in good warm pot-liquor, I'll make a fus'-class baby out'n her."

Moriah had always been a good woman, and as she stood before me, laying bare the scheme that, no matter what the conditions, had in it the smallest selfish consideration, I felt my heart warm to her again, and I could not but feel that the little whitewasher—a kindly, hard-pressed family man of slight account—would do well to lay his brood upon her ample bosom.

Of course she was marrying him, and her acquisition of family would inevitably become pensioners upon our bounty; but this is not a great matter in a land where the so-called "cultivation" of the soil is mainly a question of pruning and selection, and clothes grow upon the commonest bush.

As she turned to go, I even offered her my best wishes, and when I laughingly asked her if I might help her with her wedding-dress, she turned and looked at me.

"Bless yo' heart, Mis' Gladys," she exclaimed, "I ain't gwine out o' mo'nin'! I gwine marry Pete in des what I got on my back. I'll marry him, an' I'll take dem little no-'counts o' his'n, an' I'll make folks out'n 'em 'fo' I gits th'ough wid 'em, ef Gord spares me; but he nee'n't ter lay out ter come in 'twix' me an' my full year o' mo'nin' fur Numa. When I walks inter dat chu'ch, 'cep'n' fur de owange wreaf, which of co'se in a Christian ma'iage I'm boun' ter wear, folks 'll be a heap mo' 'minded o' Numa 'n dey will o' de bridegroom. An' dem chillen o' his'n, which ain't nuver is had no proper mo'nin' fur dey mammy—no mo' 'n what color Gord give 'em in dey skins—I gwine put 'em in special secon' mo'nin', 'cordin' to de time dey ought ter been wearin' it; an' when we walks up de island o' de chu'ch, dey got ter foller, two by two, keepin' time ter de fun'al march. You come ter de weddin', Mis' Gladys, an' I lay you'll 'low dat I done fixed it so dat, while I'm a-lookin' out fur de livin', de dead ain't gwine feel slighted, right nur left."

She was starting away again, and once more, while I wished her joy, I bade her be careful to make no mistake. A note of sympathy in my voice must have touched the woman, for she turned, and coming quite up to me, laid her hand upon my lap.

"Missy," she said, "I don't believe I gwine make no mistake. You know I allus did love chillen, an' I ain't nuver is had none o' my own, an' dis heah seemed like my chance. An' I been surveyin' de lan'scape o'er tryin' ter think about eve'ything I can do ter start right. I'm a-startin' wid dem chillen, puttin' 'em in mo'nin' fur Ca'line. Den, fur Pete, I gwine ring de changes on Ca'line's goodness tell he ax me, for Gord sake, ter stop, so, in years ter come, he won't have nothin' ter th'ow up ter me. An' you know de reason I done tooken fo' days off, missy? I gwine on a weddin'-trip down ter Pine Bluff, an' I wants time ter pick out a few little weddin'-presents to fetch home ter Pete."

"Pete!" I cried. "Pete is going with you, of course?"

"Pete gwine wid me? Who sesso? No, ma'am! Why, missy, how would it look fur me ter go a-skylarkin' roun' de country wid Pete—an' me in mo'nin'?

"No, indeedy! I gwine leave Pete home ter take keer dem chillen, an' I done set him a good job o' whitewashin' to do while I'm gone, too. De principles' weddin'-present I gwine fetch Pete is a fiddle. Po' Pete been wantin' a good fiddle all his life, an' he 'ain't nuver is had one. But, of co'se, I don't 'low ter let him play on it tell de full year of mo'nin' is out."

AN OPTICAL DILEMMA

Elder Bradley had lost his spectacles, and he was in despair. He was nearly blind without them, and there was no one at home to hunt them for him. His wife had gone out visiting for the afternoon; and he had just seen Dinah, the cook, stride gleefully out the front gate at the end of the lane, arrayed in all her "s'ciety uniform," on her way to a church funeral. She would not be home until dark.

It was growing late in the afternoon, and the elder had to make out his report to be read at the meeting of the session this evening. It had to be done.

He could not, from where he sat, distinguish the pink lion's head from the purple rose-buds on the handsome new American Brussels rug that his wife had bought him as a Christmas gift—to lay under her sewing-machine—although he could put out his boot and touch it. How could he expect to find anything so small as a pair of spectacles?

The elder was a very old man, and for years his focal point had been moving off gradually, until now his chief pleasures of sight were to be found out-of-doors, where the distant views came gratefully to meet him.

He could more easily distinguish the dark glass insulators from the little sparrows that sometimes came to visit them upon the telegraph pole a quarter of a mile away than he could discriminate between the beans and the pie that sometimes lay together on his dinner plate.

Indeed, when his glasses stayed lost over mealtimes, as they had occasionally done, he had, after vainly struggling to locate the various viands upon his plate and suffering repeated palatal disappointments, generally ended by stirring them all together, with the declaration that he would at least get one certain taste, and abide by it.

This would seem to show him to have been an essentially amiable man, even though he was occasionally mastered by such outbursts of impatience as this; for, be it said to his credit, he always left a clean plate.

The truth is, Elder Bradley was an earnest, good man, and he had tried all his life, in a modest, undeclared way, to be a Christian philosopher. And he would try it now. He had been, for an hour after his mishap, walking more rapidly than was his habit up and down the entire length of the hall that divided the house into two distinct sides, and his head had hung low upon his bosom. He had been pondering. Or perhaps he had been praying. His dilemma was by no means a thing to be taken lightly.

Suddenly realizing, however, that he had squandered the greater part of a valuable afternoon in useless repining, he now lifted his head and glanced about him.

"I'm a-goin' to find them blame spec's—eyes or no eyes!" He spoke with a steady voice that had in it the ring of the invincible spirit that dares failure. And now, having resolved and spoken, he turned and entered the dining-room—and sat down. It was here that he remembered having last used the glasses. He would sit here and think.

It was a rather small room, which would have been an advantage in ordinary circumstances. But to the elder its dimensions were an insurmountable difficulty. How can one compass a forty-rod focus within the limits of a twelve by sixteen foot room?

But if his eyes could not help him, his hands must. He had taken as few steps as possible in going about the room, lest he should tread upon the glasses unawares; and now, stepping gingerly, and sometimes merely pushing his feet along, he approached his writing-table and sat down before it. Then he began to feel. It was a tedious experiment and a hazardous one, and after a few moments of nervous and fruitless groping, he sought relief in expression.

"That's right! turn over!" he exclaimed. "I s'pose you're the red ink! Now if I could jest capsize the mucilage-bottle an' my bag o' snuff, an' stir in that Seidlitz-powder I laid out here to take, it would be purty cheerful for them fiddle-de-dees an' furbelows thet's layin' everywhere. I hope they'll ketch it ef anything does! They's nothin' I feel so much like doin' ez takin' a spoon to the whole business!"

The elder was a popular father, grandfather, uncle, husband, and Bible-class teacher to a band of devoted women of needle-work and hand-painting proclivities, and his writing-table was a favorite target for their patiently wrought love-missiles.

One of the strongest evidences of the old man's kindliness of nature was that it was only when he was wrought up to the point of desperation, as now, that he spoke his mind about the gewgaws which his soul despised.

There are very few good old elders in the Presbyterian Church who care to have pink bows tied on their penholders, or to be reminded at every turn that they are hand-painted and daisy-decked "Dear Grandfathers." It is rather inconvenient to have to dodge a daisy or a motto every time one wants to dry a letter on his blotting-pad, and the hand-painted paper-cutter was never meant to cut anything.

"Yes," the good old man repeated, "ef I knowed I could stir in every blame thing thet's got a ribbon bow or a bo'quet on it, I'd take a spoon to this table now—an' stir the whole business up—an' start fresh!"

Still, as his hand tipped a bottle presently, he caught it and set it cautiously back in its place.

He had begun now to systematically feel over the table, proceeding regularly with both hands from left to right and back again, until on a last return trip he discerned the edge of the mahogany next his body. And then he said—and he said it with spirit:

"Dod blast it! They ain't here—nowheres!"

He sat still now for a moment in thought. And then he began to remember that he had sat talking to his wife at the sewing-machine just before she left the house. He rose and examined the table of the machine and the floor beneath it. Then he tried the sideboard and the window-sill, where he had read his morning chapter from St. Paul's Epistle to the Romans, chapter viii.

He even shook out the leaves of his Testament upon the floor between his knees and felt for them there. There had been a Biblical surrender of this sort more than once in the past, and he never failed to go to the Good Book for relief, even when, as now, he distinctly remembered having worn the glasses after his daily reading.

Failing to find them here, he suddenly ran his hand over his forehead with an eager movement. Many a time these very spectacles had come back to him there, and, strange to say, it was always one of the last places he remembered to examine. But they were not there now.

He chuckled, even in his despair, as he dropped his hand.

"I'll look there ag'in after a while. Maybe when he's afeerd I'll clair lose my soul, he'll fetch 'em back to me!"

The old man had often playfully asserted that his "guardeen angel" found his lost glasses, and laid them back on his head for him when he saw him tried beyond his strength. And maybe he was right. Who can tell? That there is some sort of so-called "supernatural" intervention in such matters there seems to be little doubt.

There is a race—of brownies, probably, or maybe they are imps—whose business in life seems to be to catch up any needed trifle—a suddenly dropped needle, the very leaf in the morning paper that the reader held a moment ago and that holds "continuations," the scissors just now at his elbow, his collar button—and to hide it until the loser swears his ultimate, most desperate swear!

When the profanity is satisfactory, the little fellows usually fetch back the missing article, lay it noiselessly under the swearer's nose, and vanish.

At other times, when the victim persistently declines profanity, they have been known to amiably restore the articles after a reasonable time, and to lay them so absurdly in evidence that the hitherto forbearing man breaks his record in a volley of imprecations.

When this happens, if one has presence of mind to listen, he can distinctly hear a fine metallic titter along the tops of the furniture and a hasty scamper, as of tiny scurrying feet.

This may sound jocund, but the writer testifies that it is true.

Of course when the victim is a lady the pixies do not require of them men's oaths. But they will have only her best.

When the elder had tried in vain all the probable places where the glasses might be hidden, he began to realize that there was only one thing left for him to do. He must feel all over the floor.

He was a fat old man and short of neck.

For five years he had realized a feeling of thankfulness that the Presbyterian form of worship permitted standing in prayer. It hurt him to kneel. But nothing could hurt him so much as to fail to hand in his report to-night. Indeed, the missionary collection would be affected by it. It must be written.

He found a corner in the room and got down on his marrow-bones, throwing his hands forward and bringing them back in far-reaching curves, as one swimming. This was hard work, and before many minutes great drops of perspiration were falling upon the carpet and the old man's breath came in quick gasps.

"Ef I jest had the blame things for a minute to slip on my eyes, why, I could find 'em—easy enough!" he ejaculated—desperation in his voice.

And then he proceeded to say a number of things that were lacking in moderation, and consequently very sinful—in an elder of the church.

The "bad words" spoken in the vacant house fell accusingly upon the speaker's ears, and they must have startled him, for he hastened to add: "I don't see where no sense o' jestice comes in, nohow, in allowin' a man on the very eve of doin' his Christian duty to lose his most important wherewithal!"

This plea was no doubt in mild extenuation of the explosive that had preceded it, and as he turned and drew himself forward by his elbows to compass a new section of the room, which, by-the-way, seemed suddenly expanded in size, he began to realize that the plea was in itself most sinful—even more so than the outburst, perhaps, being an implication of divine injustice.

A lump came into his throat, and as he proceeded laboriously along on his dry swim, he felt for a moment in danger of crying.

Of course this would never do, but there was just so much emotion within him, and it had begun to ferment.

Before he realized his excitement his arms were flying about wildly and he was shrieking in a frenzy.

"But I must have 'em! I must have 'em! I must, I say; O Lord, I must—I must have them spectacles! Lor-r-d, I have work to do—for Thee—an' I am eager to perform it. All I ask is five minutes' use o' my eyes, so thet I may pursue this search in patience—"

His voice broke in a sob.

And just now it was that his left hand, fumbling over the foot of the sewing-machine treadle, ran against a familiar bit of steel wire.

If it had connected with an ordinary electric battery, the resulting shock could scarcely have been more pronounced.

There was something really pathetic in the spasmodic grasp with which he seized the glasses, and as he rose to a sitting posture and lifted them to his eyes, his hand shook pitifully.

"Thank the Lord! Now I can see to look for 'em!" And as he tremblingly brought the curved ends of the wire around his ears he exclaimed with fervor, "Yas, Lord, with Thy help I will keep my vow—an' pursue this search in patience." His wet, red face beamed with pleasure over the recovery of his near vision. So happy was he, indeed, in the new possession, that, instead of rising, he sat still in the middle of the floor, running his eyes with rapid scrutiny over the carpet near him. He sat here a long time—even forgetting his discomfort, while he turned as on a pivot as the search required. Though the missing articles did not promptly appear at his side, Bradley felt that he was having a good time, and so he was, comparatively. Of course he would find the glasses presently. He looked at his watch. What a joy to see its face! He would still have time to do the report, if he hurried a little. He began to rise by painful stages.

"Lemme see! The last thing I done was to open the sideboa'd an' cut a piece o' pie an' eat it. I must o' had my glasses on then. I ricollec' it was sweet-potato pie, an' it was scorched on one side. Lordy! but what a pleasure it is to look for a thing when a person can look!" He crossed over to the sideboard.

"Yas"—he had opened the door and was cutting another piece of pie. "Yas. Sweet-potato pie, an' burnt on one side—the side thet's left. Yas, an' I'll leave it ag'in!" He chuckled as he took a deep bite.

"Of co'se I must 'a' had 'em on when I cut the pie, or I couldn't 've saw it so distinc'—'an I finished that slice a-settin' down talkin' to her at the sewin'-machine. Ricollec' I told her how mother used to put cinnamon in hers. I'll go set there ag'in, an' maybe by lookin' 'round—They might 'a' dropped in her darnin'-basket."

It was while he sat here, running one hand through the basket and holding the slice of pie in the other, that he heard a step, and, looking up, he saw his wife standing in the door.

"Why, Ephraim! What on earth!" she exclaimed. "I lef you there eatin' that pie fo' hours ago, an' I come back an' find you settin' there yet! You cert'n'y 'ain't forgot to make out yo' report?"

"Forgot nothin', Maria." He swallowed laboriously as he spoke. "I 'ain't done a thing sence you been gone but look for my glasses—not a blame thing. An' I'm a-lookin' for 'em yet."

Mrs. Bradley was frightened. She walked straight up to her husband and took his hand. "Ephraim," she said, gently, and as she spoke she drew the remainder of the pie from his yielding fingers—"Ephraim, I wouldn't eat any mo' o' that heavy pie ef I was you. You ain't well. Ef you can't make no mo' headway'n that on yo' favorite pie in fo' hours, you're shorely goin' to be took sick." She took her handkerchief and wiped his forehead. And then she added, with a sweet, wifely tenderness: "To prove to you thet you ain't well, honey, yo' glasses are on yo' nose right now. You better go lay down."

Bradley looked straight into her face for some moments, but he did not even blink. Then he said, in an awe-stricken voice: "Ef what you say is true, Maria—an' from the clairness with which I see the serious expression of yo' countenance I reckon it must be so—ef it is so—" He paused here, and a new light came into his eyes, and then they filled with tears. "Why, Maria honey, of co'se it's so! I know when I found 'em! But I was so full o' the thought thet ef I jest had my sight I could look for 'em thet I slipped 'em on my nose an' continued the search. Feel my pulse, honey; I've no doubt you're right. I'm a-goin' to have a spell o' sickness."

"Yes, dearie, I'm 'feered you are."

The good woman drew him over to the lounge and carefully adjusted a pillow to his head. "Now take a little nap, an' I'll send word over to Elder Jones's thet you ain't feelin' well an' can't come to prayer-meetin' to-night. What you need is rest, an' a change o' subject. I jest been over to May Bennett's, an' she's give out thet she an' Pete Sanders has broke off their engagement—an' Joe Legget, why his leg's amputated clean off—an' Susan Tucker's baby had seven spasms an'—"

"That so? I'm glad to hear it, wife. But ef you send word over to him thet I ain't well, don't send tell the last minute, please. Ef you was to, he'd come by here, shore—an' they'd be questions ast, an' I couldn't stand it. Jest send word when the second bell starts a-ringin' thet I ain't well. An' I ain't, Maria."

"I'm convinced o' that, Ephraim—or I wouldn't send the message—an' you know it. We ain't so hard pressed for excuses thet we're goin' to lie about it. I knowed you wasn't well ez soon ez I see that piece o' pie."

Bradley coughed a little. "Appearances is sometimes deceitful, Maria. I hadn't wrastled with that pie ez unsuccessful ez I seemed. That was the second slice I'd et sence you left. No, the truth is, I lost my glasses, an' I got erritated an' flew into a temper an' said things. An' the Lord, He punished me. He took my reason away. He gimme the glasses an' denied me the knowledge of 'em. But I'm thankful to Him for lettin' me have 'em—anyhow. Ef I was fo'ordained to search for 'em, it was mighty merciful in Him to loan 'em to me to do it with."

THE SECOND MRS. SLIMM

Ezra Slimm was a widower of nearly a year, and, as a consequence, was in a state of mind not unusual in like circumstances.

True, the said state of mind had not in his case manifested itself in the toilet bloomings, friskiness of demeanor, and protestations of youth renewed which had characterized the first signs of the same in the usual run of Simpkinsville widowers up to date. If he had for several months been mentally casting about for another wife, he had betrayed it by no outward and visible sign. The fact is Ezra's case was somewhat exceptional, as we shall presently see.

Although he was quite diminutive in size, there was in his bearing, as with hands clasped behind him he paced up and down before his lonely fireside, a distinct dignity that was not only essentially manly—it was gentlemanly.

The refinement of feeling underlying this no doubt aggravated the dilemma in which he found himself, and which we cannot sooner comprehend than by attending to his soliloquy as he reviewed his trials in the following somewhat rambling fashion:

"No, 'twouldn't never do in the world—never, never. 'Twouldn't never do to marry any o' these girls round here thet knows all my ups an' downs with—with pore Jinny. 'Twouldn't never do. Any girl thet knew thet her husband had been chastised by his first wife the way I've been would think thet ef she got fretted she was lettin' 'im off easy on a tongue-lashin'. An' I s'pose they is times when any woman gits sort o' wrought up, livin' day in an' day out with a man. No, 'twouldn't never do," he repeated, as, thrusting both hands in his pockets, he stopped before the fire, and steadying the top of his head against the mantel, studied the logs for a moment.

"An' so the day pore Jinny took it upon herself to lay me acrost her lap an' punish me in the presence of sech ill-mannered persons ez has seen fit to make a joke of it—though I don't see where the fun comes in—well, that day she settled the hash for number two so fur ez this town goes.

"No, 'twouldn't never do in the world! Even ef she never throwed it up to me, I'd be suspicious. She couldn't even to say clap her hands together to kill a mosquito less'n I'd think she was insinuatin'. An' jest ez quick ez any man suspicions thet his wife is a-naggin' him intentional, it's good-by happiness.

"Ef 'twasn't for that, of co'se they's more'n one young woman roun' this county thet any man might go further an' do worse than git.

"Not thet I hold it agin Jinny, now she's gone, but—"

He had resumed his promenade, extending it through a second room as he proceeded:

"—but it does seem strange how a woman gifted in prayer ez she was, an' with all her instinc's religious the way hers was, should o' been allowed to take sech satisfaction in naggin' the very one she agonized most over in prayer, which I know she done over me, for I've heerd 'er. An' ef she had o' once-t mentioned me to the Lord confidential ez a person fitten to commingle with the cherubim an' seraphim, 'stid of a pore lost sinner not fitten to bresh up their wing-feathers for 'em, I b'lieve I might o' give in. I don't wonder I 'ain't never had a call to enter the Kingdom on her ricommendation. 'Twouldn't o' been fair to the innocent angels thet would 'a' been called on to associate with me. That's the way I look at it.

"An' yit Jinny 'lowed herself thet my out'ard ac's was good, but bein' ez they didn't spring from a converted heart, they was jest nachel hypocercy, an' thet ef I'd o' lied an' stole, or even answered her back, she'd o' had more hope for me, because, sez she, a 'consistent sinner is ap' to make a consistent Christian.'

"She even tol' me one day—pore Jinny! I can see her face light up now when she said it—sez she, 'I'm ac-chilly most afeerd to see you converted, less'n you'll break out in some devilment you hadn't never thought about before-you're that inconsistent.'

"'I'M AC-CHILLY MOST AFEERD TO SEE YOU CONVERTED'"

"Sometimes I feel mean to think I don't miss 'er more'n what I do—an' she so lively, too. Tell the truth, I miss them little devils she used to print on the butter pads she set at my plate ez a warnin' to me—seem to me I miss them jest about ez much ez I miss her.

"The nearest I ever did come to answerin' her back—'cept, of co'se, the time she chastised me—was the way I used regular to heat my knife-blade good an' hot 'twix' two batter-cakes an' flatten that devil out delib'rate. But he'd be back nex' day, pitchfork an' all.

"But with it all Jinny loved me—in her own way, of co'se. Doubt if I'll ever git another to love me ez well; 'n' don't know ez I crave it, less'n she was different dispositioned.

"I've done paid her all the respec's I know—put up a fine Bible-texted tombstone for her, an' had her daguerre'type enlarged to a po'tr'it. I don't know's I'm obligated to do any more, 'cep'n, of co'se, to wait till the year's out, which, not havin' no young children in need of a mother, I couldn't hardly do less than do."

It was about a week after this that Ezra sat beside his fire reading his paper, when his eye happened to fall upon the following paragraph among the "personals":