Litchfield enquirer., 1872-02-22
From the N. '. Tribune. An Everyday story.


 obscure, belonged to soscommUnana poor class, that no notice of her death found place in even the cheapest paper, and no one who knew her will read these words. Only one of those thousands of ordinary lives that, day by day, end unnoticed, no more missed by the world than so many burned-out candles. This woman had neither beauty, nor wit, nor large culture; she brought no gift with her when she was born to make her greatly welcome to the I world never could singsa song, nor write ! poem; was not even fitted to reign in a drawing-room. She was only a sweet voiced, gentle lady, full of womanly aftec- tion and eager tenderness, who had kept her pure childish beliefs unchanged to middle age. She was little, sickly, shab- billy clothed; she lived in q tawdry house with glaring paper on the walls, and torn, dirty mating on the hoor the air she breathed was that of want and vulgarity; year in and year out she worked at ma chine, sewing dresses for servants and
 shop-girls who bullied her, not unreason- ably, for she was but poor sempstress, if the truth must be told Her husband, 0 coarse grained, gossiping fellow, tried this trade and that, became ward politi- clan, did what he could for his family, but felt that his wife must do her share. He had been used to raw-boned, stout Con- ! necticut farm women, beside whom she doubtless appeared inefficient enough.
 If others remembered how tenderly nur. tured she had been as girl, and that the
 fortune she brought him he had flung
 away, he never did. Nor did she. They
 were wretchedly poor, and it was but just
 and proper she should work. So she work | ed, stopping now and then to give birth
 to another child, to be nursed at the tired breast, and watched and prayed over with l the blind, idolatrous devotion she gave to the others. Certain logical moralsts Icy down as axioms that there can be no trag- edy without crime, and that no woman,
 with love, a husband and children, ought
 to ask for more. This woman never did
 ask for more. The loud bragging politi-
 clan remained her hero to the last. If her
 life slowly dried and withered away, as
 tree might, tapped of all it's juices at the
 to blame. This poor lady was cursed with
 as finely wrought an organization as any favorite of fortune both body and mind
 required companions of her own caste,
 and that nutriment which Nature and Art give but to few, but which that few must | have or die. Besides, not even the strong est woman can furnish bread and but ter for 8 housefun of children, make their clothes, keep their souls pure and their manners refined, and add to the num- Der every year. She was not strong in any ! sense so she stitched, and nursed and
 trained them, with the dirty walls about her and the torn mating under foot, and the crowd of children grew shabbier and coarser and more vulgar day by day. One
 day an old accomplishment of her girl | hood recurred to her: fower-painting,
 molding in clay, designing it does not
 matter what; work, however, in which her
 real nature would have found food and
 expression, and the pay for which would have been comparative affluence. She sent
 specimen of her work for trial, which
 was approved; but-men were employed
 who had been trained to business. Only
 the machine was left, and the work for her | chlldrens bodies and souls that she could
 not do. It grew and grew before her sight
 Sntl the day came when she dropped as under an intolerable burden As she lay l on the bed day after day slowly dying, husband and children were loud in sor- row and astonishment. "How had she come by such manifold diseases? Machine work and want of air '? It was incredible She struggled with her work yet, sewed as she lay on her back, drew her children close to her with hungry unsatisfed love ! in her eyes that they could not understand. But as the the hour came for her to quit the world that had been so niggardly of ! It's comfort or bounty to her, she was be- set with restless fancies, which to her hus- band seemed scarcely sane. 'She thinks If she could see and smell 0 thorny rose that used to grow wild about the farms down there in Maryland where sine was
 born, she would be we'll again. Now what good could there be in rose ?' He could
 not see why she would make them put the children out of the room, and turn out the gas that she could not see the ma
 chine, and so lie looking up at the patch of sky above the brick walls When she ! was dead, he cried, '1 did what I could ::
 I am not to blame." And it was true no man can go beyond his nature. m a} B What was to blame? Not poverty; not the working for bread and butter not the
 unequal marriage. Since the world began
 King Cophetuas have married beggar girls
 untitled, and clothed them royalty in their l own flames; and Titanias have rejoiced to
 worship an ass. But if she had been taught
 practically the one occupation for which
 her taste and ability fitted her? If all
 women were 50 thoroughly taught such
 occupations that employment would be open to them as men? The answer mat .ters nothing to her now. 4 day or two
 ago the worn-out body was laid back ill
 the earth to which it had been drawn by
 such strong and subtle kinship. To what
 rest or recompense the soul of the gentle
 lady passed, only He knows who took it
 hence. Her work remains unfinished.
 But 1t IS because there are so many thou.
 sands of over-worked women around ua on every side, staring blankly at their un-
 conquerable work, and lives wasted at
 noon-day, that we have told her story, and
 reverently held back her memory, for this
 brief moment, out of the eternal silence.
 ''You have lost your baby, hear, said
 one gentleman to another. 'sYes, poor little thing it was only five months old.
 We did all we could for it. We had four
 doctors, blistered it's head and feet, put
 mustard poultices all over it, gave it nine calomel powders, leached it temples had
 it bled, gave it all kinds of medicines anu
 yet after 8 weeks illness it died. 1 It is getting to be an open uuestio.k
 whether Columbus travelled the most be- fore he died or since. He was first buried
 at the convent of St. Francis: then his
 body was remhved to the monastery of Las Cuevas; in 1886 it was removed across the Atlantic to San Domingo; in 1793 it
 was removed to the Havana Cathedral.
 and now the news comes that the body is
 again to be removed and used to start a
 new cemetery in Havana. l.a1 r 1 A Springfield clergyman began to mar " the groomsman and bridesmaid of A wedding party in that city, few evenings
 since, and had nearly completed the job
 before the groomsman mustered courage enough to object. The mortified minister
 then proceeded to join the right parties
 l The editor of the Chicago Post tells
 this: "What would you do if mamma
 should die2" asked . lady, with whom .vs