Anti-slavery bugle. [volume] (New-Lisbon, Ohio) 1845-1861, 1849-03-23


ker's house had some hand in it. How
ever, on the morning of the day we now
write Of, he had got out again, and, on
his way to town had called at the same
house, with some work he had trumped
up, to pay for the dollar he had given
them. He knocked at the door no one
came. A second and third knock were
unanswered. He ventured TO lift the
latch and enter,
1t was a bright morning, but the cur
tains Of the little apartment were all
drawn, and at first he could see nothing.
Then cam TO his eyes a bed, and by il
were kneeling some sobbing children
What was on the bed He could not
see. He drew nearer. A sheet covered
the whole surface Of the shuck mattrass.
With pious hands gently he folded it
down three forms, cold as the ice on the
threshold, lay there side by side-a mo-
Their, an infant, and a little girl of five or
six years old-all so wasted that it was
terrible 10 look upon their hungry faces.
%Shuddering the old man turned back the
shroud. He looked at the kneeling chill
dren, who had at last noticed him.
They shook with cold the skin around
their temples was half transparent; he'll
eyes seemed phosphoric in the twi-
light.
Did you bring US some breadl' said
little Mora.
The whole hideous truth-which he
had held from him, afraid to think it
came like a blow upon the old mans
heart. Faint and staggering, he hasten
ed 10 the nearest store-scandaliZing old
Mrs. Strong, who saw him issue from the
door and told all her neighbors, for twen.
ty four hours, how Deacon Stiles, of Co.
lumbia had been up drinking with the
lazy fellow Spalding.
lie bought some food, begged some
fire wood, caught the first woman he
knew by the arm, and dragged her with
him and when the widowed soldier,
haggard and heavy eyed, opened his
door with his arm full Of ship yard chips,
he found a fire blazing on the hearth, a
pot simmering over it, The pale faced
children nesting in its blaze, and the
Deacon doing out TO them very small
mouthfuls Of very dry bread, bidding them
be careful to eat slow, and 'masticate
thoroughly direction which resulted
mainly in opening their sunken eyes till
they looked like four dwarf spectres.
A few questions identified the present
helper with the friend Of the snowy night.
Little Mora, indeed, had whispered
twenty times that it was he. A few
words explained the misery of the En-.
glishman. The sale of the shirts for
their cost; the necessity of paying their
rent with Johns earnings-for while the
wife was sick they could not move, the
last disappointment at Reuben Small's
the short and shorter allowance Of food,
dwindled to nothing +; his constant atteu-
dance for nearly forty eight hours by the
triple deathbed, which had taken away
even the fragment of a meal and the
: semblance Of a hre-these things were
soon told.
As the husband and father closed his
melancholy tale, he rose, went TO the
drawer, and brought to the Deacon the
emnant of flannel and the price of what
he had used, telling him what it was.-
The old man sprang from his chair,
upsetting the table, with the pitcher OF
milk and the loaf of bread, and dropping
from his lap the morsels he had been
cutting with his jack knife.
Great God and you have been STAR
wing with this moneyin the houser
1T was not mine,' said the soldier,
quietly.
The next morning, the comfortable lit.
tie one-horse wagon owned by Mr..
Small was foundering on its way to Full
ton, every mud hole bringing a maledic-
ton half way up Reuben's throat. He
wished the Common Council, and Dea.
con Stiles and all folks who were fools
enough to starve, just where they belong.
ed. When he got TO the turnpike, his
soul grew smoother, but presently came
the locomotive, that demon 10 the eyes
of horse-flesh, and the unhappy man was
forced 10 scramble out into the mire, and
wresile with his terrified beast, until,
from hip to ankle, he was a real estate
owner in that detestable own Of Fulton
In what state Of mind, therefore, he drew
near the end of his journey, may be i'm.
agined.
Atlength, they reached the point where
the Deacon had told them TO stop. The
horse was hilched, the hill climbed, the
house recognized by the black Grape on
the latch, the latch lifted, and Reuben
stood in that dwelling which might never
have been visited by Death, had he but
asked a few kind questions of the man
whose wife was a seamstress, or been
willing 10 take his neighbours assurance
that a poor man might be trusted-an as
surance he would have taken in a mo.
ment, had a country merchant been the
customer.
On the bed, the only resting place,
were the two collins from the one, the
wasted features Of mother and babe, from