Worcester daily spy. [volume] (Worcester [Mass.]) 1850-1888, 1862-03-04
MOrfester @a1lp Spp.

OLD FASHIONED CoMFoRTs-Our ances
tors were frugal, self-denying people, Injured
to hardship from the cradle; they were
content 10 be without almost ali the luxuries
OF life, but they enjoyed some OF its comforts.
to which many OF US are strangers Gold fash
Toned comforts, we may say) and among
these the Old fireplace, as it used to be term.
Ell, held no mean rank. How wildly the pic
ture OF one OF those spacious kitchens of the
olden times comes to our mind, with its plain
furniture and sanded floor, innocent Of paint,
but as white as the neatest Of housewives
could make 1t In one corner stood the clock,
It's very face wearing an aspect of good cheer,
and seeming to smile benignantly upon a min.
iature moon over its head which, tradition
said, had at a remote period, followed the
rising and setting of its great prototype i'll the
heavens, through its days OF active service
were long ago over.
But the browning glory of that kitchen was
not its white sanded floor nor the high desk,
with Its pigeon holes and secret drawers,
which no VentureSome youngster ever dared
to invade; nor yet the old clock, ticking SO
unsteady in the corner but it was the old.
fashioned flre place, with its blazing embers,
huge back-logs, and iron fire-dogs, that shed
glory over the whole room, gded the plain
and homely furniture with its light, and rem
dered the place type of true New England
i'll Eye olden times"
Never were there such apples as those
which swung around and around upon strings
before the bright fire of winters evening,
never such baked potatoes as those buried
deep in the ashes upon the hearth, never such
coInstalks as those which caught golden
hue from the b azing embers, or turkey like
those turned upon spit, filling the room with
savory odors so suggestive of dainty repast.
Before the fire was the wooden settle, and
here the children were wont TO sit in the long
evening, telling stories, cracking nuts, coming
their lessons for the morrow or listening in
silence to the words of wisdom that fell from
the lips of their superiors, and anon gazing in
silence into the bright fire, and coniuring up
all sorts of grotesque tanciul images from
among the burning Goals. No tabled genii,
with their magic lamps of enclantment, could
build sucn gorgeous palaces, or create such
gems as the child could discern amid the baz-
ing embers of the old-fashioned fire place.
And we must not neglect the chimney cor
ner, where sat our grandfather in his accus.
toned seat his hair silvered with the SHOWS
OF many winters-a venerable man, to whom
old age had come "frostly but kindly" and
whose last days were like those of an Indian
summer, serene and beautiful, even till the
stars appeared in heaven.
How pure was the air in those days! The
huge fire place, with lis brisk draught, carried
of the impurities OF the atmosphere, and left
the cir pure, lifegiving and healthful. Now,
we crouch around hot cooklng-stoves, and
think it strange that we feel so stupid and
drowsy of an evening or we hudde about
alright stoves, and wonder that the air seems
burned and impure; or we sit down in chilly
rooms heated By furnace, and marvel that
with all our costly furniture, soft carpets,
bright mirrors and damask curtains they are