Quasqueton guardian. (Quasqueton, Buchanan County, Iowa) 1856-1858, 1857-10-29

her. Nhe said she had not been sick.
lived very happy, DC. but she had
grown thin, she was meanly clad in cheap
old-kishioned garments. She seemed
neither to know or care what was going
on in the literary world, or indeed in
any world except that bound by the four
walls of her own home for she was very
anxious to return, and did so in few
days, leaving us all sad and wondering
at the change that had come over her.
In five years more, mother and i went
to visit her. My dear friend, such, q
sight would %al dsf hay1h husband, fine, robust,
healthy man, and there was his splendid
farm, field after field waving with ripen-
ing grain, and hired men and teams of
horses, and reaping and moving ma
chimes were preparing for the harvest
which three great barns stood ready to
receive; Hocks of sheep and herds of
cattle filed the pastures and reposed un-
der the trees left for their protection,
while the great white house, my sisters
home, stood stark and isolated in a treeless
field, without shrub, clambering vine,
or even a green shutter to relieve the
blank and glaring walls, and she, the
mistress of the house, the wife of the
owner of all this wealth, was sitting on
broken stool on the earth floor of an
out door cellar, working over butter with
piece of Whitfield shingle, on a board
which she held slanting in her lap to
drip into bucket at her side I! The pale
thin phantom in that damp vault, with
her slip-shod feet, her blue cotton dress,
Bcant and faded, the wan smile on her
wierd looking face, and her little skinny
hand stretched out for welcome, was Hell
en- She led us down into her living
tomb, and showed us long rows of pans
brimming with milk, and firkin after fir
kin of golden butter which she had been
all the spring and summer laying down
for the autumn and winter market and
then we went out and saw her sixteen
dairy cows, and her poultry yaad with
its uncounted inmates, to whose wants
and products she attended personally each
day In "a eaal cha I'M hap in tho e,--. :
white house, were barrels of eggs ready
for the last boats to float down the Mis-
sissippi, to make winter feasts in south
ern cities. Four sturdy boys tumbled
about among the weeds in the yard,
chased the pigs, tore their clothes, rioted
through the uncarpeted rooms, and dis
turbed people and things generally
Helen was OH the 60 from daylight till
late bedtime, hurrying about in her eag
er, breathless way, attending to every
part of her household, doing all the work
with her own hands, sacrificing ease,
health, intellect, life itself, to crafty her
husbands grasping ambition for wealth.
1t was painful thing to see, and we
made our visit short.
A year ago her husband was caught
and instantly crushed to death by some
Of the machinery on his farm. She,
poor thing, lives on, though I verify be-
lieve it is because there is nothing left
of her to die Her Oldest son has run
away, the three, others are as untamable
as the young buffaloes of their native
prairies, and her youngest child, her on
ly daughter is a helpless idiot She is
rich, she has lands and money, but what
are they to her ? What is life to her or
what has it ever been but a living death
since she left her fathers roof? A far
mer's wife No, rather let me dig my
own grave, and bury myself at once than
be consigned to such DOOM
But, Mary, this is an extreme case, l
said. All farmers wives are not treated
like your sister.
No; thank Heaven, all are not and
yet l can point you to dozen within the
circle of our own neighborhood. whose
lives differ from hers only in degree
Their whole existence is one ceaseless
round of drudgeries, all centering in the
steaming kettle on the kitchen fire. Look
at the hired men and machinery in the
field TO Tighten the farmers labors, and
then look at the wife, denied the aid of
even one one assistant in the labor which
provides for the comfort Of all They
cannot afford help for her. But they can
afford to crush her intellect and wear out
the delicate machinery of her frame in
the most menial toll, and they do it with
outa particle of hesitation or remorse."
You will find such things in all
classes of life, and if you were to know
both sides of these histories you would
as often find the wife to blame as the hus-
band" said.