Lamoille newsdealer. [volume] (Hyde Park, Vt.) 1860-1877, 1860-12-14

some time, and she reached out her hands
such outragcs upon the weak and expos
ed," was answered " If the vital power
is weak so much greater reason for not
assaulting it,
"You are warm on the subject my
dear''
"And with reason" replied the wife.
." Let me give you clearer comprehen-
sion of my state of mind. One day when
not over eight years of age l was visiting
little girl, the child of a neighbor. She
had a wax doll of rare beauty, which, in
compliment to her visitor, she was per-
mitted to bring forth from it's safe reposi-
tory in bureau drawer. Many injunc-
tions of carefullness were given, and
some threats of consequences added,
should the doll receive injury. My little
companion let me hold the baby -ef6gy
on my lap, and surely, no living baby
was ever held with tenderer care. l
to take it. In lifting it from my lap one
arm caught in a string and a sudden jerk
following, dolly fell to the floor. A loud
cry of anguish filled the air in moment
afterward, for one of dolls fair cheeks
|
were crushed in, and her nose hopelessly
broken. I lifted the ruined beauty, and
stood holding it in my hand, when the
mother of my companion, alarmed by the
distressing cries of her child, came run
ming up to the room in which we had been
playing. She saw the disfgured doll in
my hand, and instantly her eyes flashed
angrily."
$50 you've broken it for her!" she ex-
claimed, with cutting severity of tone.
:" | expected as much. wish you'd stay
at home and not come over here destroy
ing my child's things"
." / laid the doll in chair without say
ing word, and went home. AS | left
the room | heard the little girl say, at
wasn't her fault, mamma. She didn't dc
it." There was justification in that, but it
did not change my state toward the lady
nor soothe my hurt feelings. went
home and cried about it all the afternoon.
Then succeeded bitter dislike of the lady.
| could not bear to meet her. She was,
in my mind, the personifcation of moral
ugliness. | can remember having often
felt pity for her child that she had such a
mother p r
But was all this right y interrupted
the husband. "The lady spoke in sudden
blind passion, and you should have for
gotten it," ir aHt M
II am not justifying myself, Edward, .
was answered; "and as to forgetting, that
is no act of the will. / wish / could for
get; I've tried often enough, heaven
knows 1t is the mental condition that
was produced, to which l am now draw
your attention--the fact of bending a
air-growing twig from its uprightness,
and thus marring the tree by deformity.
| was sensitive proud child if you will
fond of approval, and keenly alive to
wrong or injustice; she was a woman
standing in power and in reason far above
nae. In sudden misjudgment, she thrust
at me angrily, and wounded me to the
quick. was not to blame, The fault
was with her, She assaulted me at the
weakest point and the injury / sustained
was ireparable.' am gag
+" You surprise me, Anne, said the hus-
band looking concerned, sis it possible
that child's memory can so grow into a
woman's life and consciousness =? | could
not believe it, ailt T9 aie Tfo
"Do you remember the reply of a boy
when asked why a certain tree had grown
crooked. Somebody must have trod on
it when it was young" That woman
trampled on me when l was young, and
something in me has grown crooked. l
have gricved over it many, times, but
grief doesn't change the deformity. 1t
has 50 happened that this lady has always
lived near me, and that neighborly associ-
ations have brought us together. I meet
her occasionally, and she is, in her way,
an excellent person-kind- hearted and
liberal to poor people, less selfish than I
/ .