Green-Mountain freeman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1844-1884, 1855-03-22
: nlistellaneous.
From Home Life, or a Peep ucross the Threshold"
THE HAUNTED HEARTH STONE.
GAN houses wherein men have lived and died,
Are haunted hOuses.u .m..

=" All houses wherein men have lived and died,
Are haunted houses" s-.s
X '' Do believe in haunted houses " said the
aged woman, speaking to herself rather than to
the fair, sweet grand child, who nestled at her
feet, aud looked up so earnestly into the wrink-
led face. " Yes, indeed do. There 8 not q
house in this whole village, nor for miles around
but that to me is haunted none, though, so
much as this" " Haunted" continued she,
speaking so slowly that a solemn emphasis SEEM
ed to rest on each letter, "yes, yes, there are
such things as haunted spots" And then she
dropped her knitting, took off her glasses, wiped
her eyes, and leaning back in her armchair
seemed lost in a sad yet holy communion with
the earlier passages of life.
1t was dark, stormy, winters night. The
wind howled fercely around the old farmhouse,
drifting the snow high on the window sis, fast
ening it to the rough pannos Of the doors, sift-
ing it through the crevices of the mossy roof,an
heaping it up like giants graves all along the
pathways throughout the garden. But indoors
all was bright, and of a summer warmth. The
huge backlog, that had been dragged in ere
twilight, was now slowly dropping into GOALS ,
while the flames from the lighter wood, which
every few minutes was cast on with no free a
hand, blazed high and ruddy, and cast genial
light and glare in the darkest corner, and scin-
tillating on the time-darkened ceiling like polar
flashes on the midnight sky.
1t was one of those bitter nights that make
the hearth-stone the bonniest spot on all the
earth, "a night when the sheltered lift up their
hearts in thanksgiving when the homeless bow
in supplication; night when children kneel
before the fire and read bright prophecies in the
, living Goals; when the aged draw their chairs
yet nearer to the blaze and warm their shiver
ing memories; night when all turn their backs
to the darkness, their face to the light.
cit is a night to make ghost stories relish
we'll do, grandmother tell one.'
The head of the young girl rested on the knee
of the old lady, and, as the latter lost the threa(
OF her dream and looked down, she could see al
enthusiastic eagerness pictured in the brigh
blue eye, a longing for some tale of romance
that dropping into her heart, should vivify it
dormant passions. She hesitated few moments
: and then tendery caressing the one lone pet o
her bosom, she said 81 will tell you stor,
about haunted hearth-stone: and, Lizzie, j
will be no tale of fiction. The plot is draw
8 from living memories, the scene is laid-here
n here" But her tremulous voice now quivere
with added notes, and after moments stern
: but useless effort at self-coutrol it burst int
sobs so loud and wild that they rivaled the erie
of the winter wind.
=, The young girl seemed not much frightened
s. and spake no soothing words, but only claspe
es the hand she had taken as she asked the stor,
of with tighter grasp. The paroxysm did nj
continue long; but, as it passed away she ros
I'd and turning her steps toward the dark, cold be-
be room, and going in closed the door, and was a
sent long while. The tears streamed dow
IN Lizzie's cheeks when left alone, and it was e,
dent that the aged relative had some secret SC
ny row, over which she mourned intensely. VIII
ed she returned, and again seated herself in h
h. usual chair, only drawing it little closer
the fire, there was such a calm, beautiful, sp
- itual look expressed upon her countenance, tn
re she could fancy that she had onversed wi
~ angels. Without any allusion to the past, wit
ill.,, out any preface, she began, after silence
H. perhaps half an hour, the promised story.
Handed down to me, it reads like this -
las 1t was night much like this forty or mt
vas years have now passed since its wind bl
rk and it's snow drifted, and since its cold p
not sled and its darkness frightened. Beside
ere same hearthstone, the same only that it Y
ext not worn 80 smooth, for the house then had te
ov- ed but thirty, instead of as now seventy and
oil winters, An aged man and his wife sat bef
tho blazing fire striving to while away the Il
the evening hours. There was not then, as nj
daily mails coming into our remote little villa
I'm, freighted with news in every shape. The p
Who did not teen as now with magazines and boo
ing it was rare to see newspaper in this old kit
ash en-, and rarer any volume, save THE ONE.