The Ashland union. [volume] (Ashland, Ashland County, Ohio) 1854-1868, 1860-03-07
TR ODD EN- UPON.
BY MRS. II. E. G. AREY.

BY MRS. H. E. G. AREY.
On low couch beneath cottage roof, a
young mother lay dying. The feeble child
which had Just come to claim from her moth
ers love; was folded in its blankets on chair
beside her. There was nothing dainty, or
costly in its foldings; but that look of extreme
weakness, which had come from the poor
mothers care, overspread their scantiness, and
poverty, and made them almost beautiful
And the humble neighbors who had come
with their neightorly offices to that chamber
of sickness, and death, looked reverently
upon those evidences of neatness and skill,
which lay about them, and knew that she
who had wrought this comfort and beauty out
of such scanty material was superior to them
selves. But her last careful work was done,
and her hands folded for their. final rest. A
welcome rest it might seem TO be for her, for
life had given her little to love and leave
She was an orphan and alone when William
Grove o-arried her, one who had felt all the
accumulated bitterness of orphange.
But the strong, hopeful young mechanic
who had taken her for his own, had felt fully
able to make the rough way smooth for her
Perhaps he was "o'er young to marry" when
he took her 20 the little two froomed cottage
where she now lay dying. But he knew that a
hard home had been hers for years, and in his
strong love for her, he would fain have shield
ed her from the sorrow with which she was so
famished.
And they were married. with nothing but
their own strong hearts, and wiling hands for
dependence. But these were enough for the
time. for they were content with little, and
William Grove was careful, and industrious /;
brave sturdy young man. always in the thick
est of the work. as those who knew him said.
But while thus in the thickest of the work, a
piece of machinery fell upon him. and he was
carried home corpse to his feeble young wife
before they had been married a twelve-month.
Poor Lefty Grovei She strove to bear IN
bravely through her misery. for the sake of
anothes And bravely ard truthfully she did
90 through her appointed time. But W her
hour was come, only moment was left for
the parting of the new born which bounded
her to the world
The glance which rested upon her child was
full of agony. none knew better than herself
the evils of that poverty and friendlessness TO
which she was leaving her. She drew nei-h-
Dor W who stood at her bedside down to her pill
low to whisper her last message. "Let me be
buried in the Potters' Field" she said, 81 hese
thing will be wanted"
"But you will want to be buried by the side
of William, Lefty" said the kind neighbor.
interrupting her.
take all we have to bury me there. My baby
will want these things. Perhaps some one
will take them as pay for taking care of her.
l cannot have her go toethe poor house. She
will die there" and she shnddered as she
thought of the fearful misery that must pre-
cede such death.
"There is Mrs Hill," the added, "She's just
married, and needs such things or her house
She would be a kind body to my Lefty, think
And bye and bye, the child would be help
to her. There is a little money in that drawer
I want it all to be saved for the care of my
baby. 1t will go agood ways with one that's
prudent"
Poor Lefty, the little comforts she had toll
ed so to gather, the rag carpet in the room
where she lay, the chairs, and the tables, and
the plain bureau which Williams own hands
had made, and the quilts, and the pillows, and
the tidy curtains which her skillful fingers
had prepared had a new value in hel
eyes, and she counted their worth with miser's
easerness, for the sake of the ease they mi gh
purchase for her child.
And the neighbors respected her wish, and
when her dust lay with the unwcpt in the
Potters' Field, her child found shelter in the
cottage she had named. ~ r.
But the neat store of household goods which
had been passed over to the newly married
couple as recompense for the shelter of th'
child, soon lost their air of neatness and beau
ty, and became familiar to them, as if they
had always been their own. And they forgo
the love that had burned in the mother
heart when all the springs of life were grow
ting cold; and the frail child received from
them only such attention as children are apt tt
receive iu the abodes of poverty when there il
no mothers hand to minister to them in ther'
helplessness. ssts-g}se = e.s-, -
Sometimes, when pride, or caprice induced
the foster mother to thake her up from the
poor couch where she was accustomed to be
moan her sorrows to herself, and make. he
tidy, she would draw forth the admiration o
the neighbors, and they would say "What !;
pretty child it is that Lefty Grove left 2 r Blu
for the most part she was left in such stat
as to attract the little notice, and no affection
from those who saw her. qfazaliI -. 5.57,
After two or three years of this life, whe1
a little one of their own had been given to thu
/ family where she claimed shelter, they be
] gan to feel that the burden was too heavy fo
them,-that they had more than repaid th'
bequest in consideration of which they ha(
received with the child, and the little Lefty
was at last sent to the poor house, from which
her mother had longed to shield her. But i
was only slight change for the worse. Ther'