The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1869-05-11
ple,ure. or .he olaen Time.
MRS. STOVES NEW NOVEL.


Mrs. Stoves novel, OldtoOn FOLKS. viii be
published in few days, by Fields, Osgood &
Co., Boston. We have received the advance
sheets, from which we make below a few ex-
tracts. This is the only novel by Mrs. Stowe
written since 1862, and is rich with the results
of the authors observation and experience
during that long time. In varied and striking
characterization, in humor and pathos, in
clear good sense and in tenderness of feeling
! it is worthy of the author of "Uncle Toms
CABIN Mrs. Stowe has given much time
and pains to its preparation, and she herself
declares that she has never been more pro-
foundly interested in any literary work she
has ever undertaken. 0ldto5s = 57ts i We De-
lieve, the only volume by Mrs. Stowe, since
the publication of 'Dred," which has appear
ed first in book form. All her other stories
have been issued serially, in weekly or month
iy periodicals.
THE MINISTER AND HIS WIFE.
In those days of New England, the minister
and his wife were considered the temporal and
spiritual superiors of everybody in the parish.
The idea which has since gained ground, of
regarding the minister and his family as a sort
Of stipendary attachment and hired officials OF
liz . Eu.
rebuked and chastened by every deacon and
deacon's wife or rich and influential parishon-
er, had not then arisen. ParsOn Lothrop was
so calmly awful in his sense of his own posi-
ton and authority, that 1t would have been a
sight worth seeing to witness any OF his parish
coming to him, as deacons and influential pa
sishoners nowadays feel at liberty to come to
their minister, with suggestions and admoni-
tions. His manner was ever gracious and affa-
ble as of man who h;abitually surveys every
n, fror,a OH and iQ diQn0cpd N Wit
indulgent courtesy, and has advice in reserve
for all seekers; but there was not the slightest
shadow of anything which encouraged the
most presuming to offer counsel in return
and so the marriage with the rich Episcopal
widow, her professional entry into Oldtown,
the coach and outriders, the brocade and satin
slippers, were all submitted to ON the part of
the Oldtown people without murmur.
The fact ii that the parson himself felt with
in his veins the traditional promptings of a
far-off church and king ancestry, and relished
with calm delight solemn trot to the meet
inghouse behind pair of fat, decorous old
family horses, with black coachman in livery
on the box. 1t struck him as sensible and be-
coming. So also he liked sideboard loaded
with massive family plate and warmed
up with the ruby hues of old wines of fly
years ripening, cleaning through crystal de-
canters, and weil-trained man-servants and
maid-servants, through whom his wig, his
shoes, and all his mortal belon gings, receive d
Qdlly anu Sutl8Uic CARE he was 10 MIS- OOrO-
thea the most deferential of husbands, always
rising with stately courtesy to offer her chair
when she entered an apartment, and hasten
ing to open the door for her if she wished TO
pass out, and passing every morning and even
ing the formal gallantries and inquiries in re-
regard to her health and well-belng which he
felt that her state and condition required.
Fancy if you can the magnificent distance
at which this sublime couple stood above lit
tie ten-year-old boy, who wore a blue checked
apron, and every day pattered barefoot after
the COWS, and who, at the time this story OF
myself begins, had just, by reaching up ON his
little bare tiptoes, struck the great black
knocker on their front door.
THE VILLAGE Do-NoTHING.
Every New England village, if you only
think of it, must have its do-nothing as regu-
lary as it has its school-house or meeting
house. Nature is always wide awake in the
matter of compensation. Work, thrift and
industry are such an incessant steam-power
in Yankee life, that society would burn itself
out with intense friction were there not inter
posed here and there the lubrieating power of
a decided do-nothing-a man who won't be
hurried, and won't work, and will take his
ease in his own way, in spite of the whole
protest of his neighborhoOd to the contrary.
And there is on the face of the whole earth
no do-nothing whose softness, idleness, general
inaptitude to labor, and everlasting, universal
shiftlessness can compare with that OF this
worthy, as found in brisk Yankee village.
Sam Lawson filed this post with ample
honor in Oldtown. He was fellow dear to
the souls of all ''us boys" in the village, be-
cause, from the social nature of his position,
he never had anything more pressing to do
than Groom and gossip with us. He was
ready to spend hours in tinkering boys
jacsknife, or mending his skate, or start at
the smallest notice to watch O wo0dchuck's
hole, or give incessant service in tending a
dogs sprained paw. He was always on hand
to go fishing with us ON Saturday afternoons;
and have known him to sit hour after hour
on the bank, surrounded by troop of boys,
batting our hooks and taking off our fish.
He was soft-hearted old body, and the
wrighlings and contCrtions of his prey USED
to disturb his repose so that 1t was regu-
lar part OF his work to kill the nsh py preak-
ing their necks when he took them from the
hook
aWhy, lordy massy, boys he would say,
ST can't bear to see no kind of critter in tor
ment. These eIe pouts amt to blame Tor
beino fish. and We ought to put 'em out of
their misery. Fish hes their rights as well
as any on us.
poking through the high grass and clover on
our back lot to look me up, as lay sobbinp
under the old apple-tree, the most iasignifi-
cant little atom OF misery that ever bewailed
the inevitable
Sam was of respectable family, and not des-
titute OF education. He was an expert in at
.o"oo nso VI si2 uluerenI KINDS OF nandlcrait,
IN all OF which he had been pronounced by
the knowing ones to be a capable workman, If
IF only he would stick to it," He had
0lacksmlth's shop, where, when the MT was
on him, he would shoe horse better tnan any
man in the county. No one could supply
missing screw or apply timely brace, with
more adroitness. He could mend cracked
china so as to be almost as good as new; ne
could usa carnenter's tools almost as well as a
horn carpenter. and would doctor rheumatic
49, or = sbaky window better than half the
professional artisans in wood. No man could
pat refractory clock to rights with l, more @ IN
genuity than Sam-that is, IL you would give
him his time to be about it.
shall never forget the wrath and dismay
which he reused in Aunt Lois's mind by the
leisurely way IN which, after having taken
our Venerable Kitchen clock to pieces, and