The Ashland union. [volume] (Ashland, Ashland County, Ohio) 1854-1868, 1857-10-14

is q shovel, wherewith we're drawn forth
the glowing embers in which We saw our
frstfanoies and dreamed our first dreams
the shovel with which we stirred the
sleepy logs till the sparks rushed up
the chimney as if a forge were in blast
below. and wished we had SO many lamps,
30 many marbles, or so many something's
that we coveted; and so it was we wished
our first wishes.
There is a CHAIR low, rush bottom
chair; there is a little wheel in the cor
ner, a big wheel in the garnet. a loom in
the chamber. There are chests full of
linen and yarn, and quilts Of rare pattern
and samplers in frames.
And everywhere and always the dear
old wrinkled face of her whose firm elias
tic step mocks the feeble saunter of her
children's ehildren--the old fashioned
grandmother of twenty years ago. Sh~,
the very Providence of the old
homestead-she who loved US all, and
said she wished there was more of US to
love, and took all the school in the Hol-
loa for grandchildren beside. A great
expansive heart was hers, beneath thaa
wooden gown,or that more stately bonn
bazine, or that sole heir loom of silken
texture.
We can see her to-day, those mild
blue eyes with more of beauty in them
than time could touch or death do more
than hide-those eyes that held both
smiles and tears within the faintest call
of every one of US, and soft reproof, that
seemed not passion but regret. A white
tress has escaped from beneath her
snowy cap;she has just restored a wan
deripg lamb to its ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
the tether of a vine that was straying
over a window, as she came in, and pluck
ed a four-leaved clover for Ellen. She
sits down by the little wheel-a tress is
running through her fingers from the
distaf's disheveled head, when a small
voice cries, ~"Grandma," from the old red
cradle, and "Grandma," Tommy shouts
from the top of the stairs. Gently she
let's 60 the thread, for her patience is
almost as beautiful as her charity, and
she touches the little red bark in a mo.
ment, till the young voyager is in a
dream again, and then directs Tommy'o
unavailing attempts to harness the cat.
The tick of the clock runs faint and low,
and size opens the mysterious door, and
proceeds to wind it up. We are all ON
i p-toe, and we beg in a breath to be
lifted up n by one, and. look in the
hundredth time upon the tin cases of
the weights, and the poor lonely pendu-
lum, which goes to and fro by its little
dim window and never comes put in the
world, and our petitions are al granted,
and We are lifted up, ard we all touch
with a finger the wonderful weights, and
the music of the little wheel is resumed.
Was Mary to be married, or Jane to
be wrapped in shroud -? So meekly did
she fold the white hands of one upon
her still bosom, that there seemed to be
a prayer in them there; and SO sweetly
did she wreathe the white rose in the
hair of the other, that one would not
have wondered had some roses budded
for company.
How she stood between US and ap-
pretended harm; how the rudest of us
softened beneath the gentle pressure of
her faded and tremulous hand From
her capacious pocket that hand was ever
Withdrawn closed, only to be opened in
ours,with the nuts she had gathered, the
cherries she had plucked, the little egg
she had found, the "turn over" she had
baked, the trinket she had purchased for
US as the product of her spinning, the
blessing she had stored for us-the off
spring of her heart.
What treasure of story fell from those
old lips; of good fairies and evil, of the
old times when she was a girl; and we
wondered if eVer-but then she couldn't
be handsomer or dearer-but that she
ever was "little." And then, when We
begged her to sing! "Sing US one of
the old songs you used to sing mother,
grandma"
"Children, I can't sing" she always
said; and mother used to lay her knit
ting softly down, and the kitten stopped
with the yarn upon the floor,
and the clock licked lower in the corner.
and the fire died down to a glow, like
old heart that is neither chilled nor
dead, and grandmother sang. To be
sure, it wouldn't do for the parlor and
the concert room nowadays; but then
was the old kitchen, and the old fash
grandmother, and the old ballad,
in the dear old times, and we can hard
ly see to write for the memory of them,
it is a hands breadth to the
sunset.
Well, she sang. Her voice was feeble
and wavering, like a fountain, just ready
to fall, but her how sweet toned it was
and it became deeper and stronger; but
couldn't grow swseter. What 'joy
of grief" it was to sit there around the
fire. all of US, except Jane that elasped
a prayer to her bosom, and her thoughts
we saw, when the hall.door was opened
. -oroan3 In tbo -;nl. IL a.. 49,