Iowa voter. [volume] (Knoxville, Iowa) 1867-1874, 1873-07-17

Matter? Oh, with Molly, you mean9
Nothing at all, guess. She is almost al
WAYS cross when she first wakes up" re-
piled the plain-spoken Ann Eliza.
| Disenchantment the first! Could this
glum, dingy vision be the radiant little
witch of last week! 1t seemed hardy
possible.
Girls, take this advice: Be as pretty as
you can or as ugly as you must, but, what
ever else you are, be neat. There IS MOTH
ing on the visible earth more unlovely
than slatternly woman. She does VIC.
lence to nature. A tumbled, dishevelled
| rosebud is no less an affront to the eye,
while simple freshness and delicacy OF
appointment can of themselves almost
beautify plain person.
1t had been easy enough for pretty
Molly to run upstairs just as Jim swung
the gate of afternoons, tumble on her
soiled wrapper, draw the curl papers
from her hair, and descend, after an hours
| delay, renovated, pulled, smoothed to
| presentable extent, with some rose or rib
| bon tucked bewitchingly into just the
effective spot, and smile and twinkle OF
the eyes that made all discrepancies of
the toilette invisible The little points
where ineradicable untidiness made itself
visible to an experienced eye, escaped
! Jim's notice completely, and but for the
| Sailing party" might have continued to
escape it until the time when, too late
for repentance, Mrs. Jim should have
i seated herself-a disreputabie vision-op-
| posite her astonished husband at her own
breakfast table But meeting thus, day
after day, and all day long, the habits OF
her life were too much for poor Molly.
| "What does ii sIgnify?"-that customary
| excuse-was uttered once and again over
tumbled dress, soiled collar, tattered stock
! ings, till even Jim's glamoured eyes be-
came observant
II "Auntie," he said one day, as in mo-
. ment of confidence he leaned his hand
;, some head on Miss Child's knee; II
. thought the Pomfrets were well off,
9 "Well?" interrogatively.
n "Well, they can't be, you know, for
Molly don't seem to have nice things like
4 the other girls. Don't you think she must
s have pretty hard times at homer"
Jim" said Aunt Mary solemnly, II
happen to know what Molly has to spend
on her dress, and if you'll keep it sacred
secret, will breathe it to you. Will you
] promises"
eyes"
"she spends exactly four hundred
dollars year"
] "Is that a good deals" asked ignorant
Jim.
/ Just then the girls passed slowly, side
by side, bearing "a freshly gathered basket
of blueberries. Grace in simple, we'll
| fitting gown Of gray, a knot Of blue under
| the white collar, q blue ribbon looping a
shady hat over the Furnished, perfectly
braided hair; the other in messy, tumbled
| white pique, half the buttons off her boots,
| a crushed pink rose surmounting curls
much in want of brushing, and soiled kid
gloves. The contrast could hardly have
been more marked even to an inexper-
| fenced eye.
"Wheww said Jim.
From that day, as she in after years de-
clared, Aunt Mary dated her triumph.
| Not that Jim transferred his affections
then and there to Grace. No! 1t was
many months later that the event happen
ed which filled Dusenberry with excite
ment, and DR.. Goodenow's mind with UNI
speakabe wonder that "that child should
be grown up enough to entertain the idea
| for moment"
From that lime, the spell of Jims un-
tidy enchan tress was broken. In vain
did Molly seek to lure him back, even
combing her curls three days running.
He would not return comb she never so
wisely. Sailing parties were horrid,"
she from that time and forever after de-
clared "She never wanted to go to one"
again.
"And so they are" agreed Aunt Mary
Child; "horrid for shame and slipshod.
But if a man wants to find really what a
girl has in her and how she does her little
every day things that are going to make
| fnr tal, ia
how she's going to look in the morning,
or at times when she isn't fixed up just 10
catch his eye, advise him to pick up a
wife where my jim found his-down at
! salt"
| Which sensible advi ce we commend to
/ all whom it may con cern.-N. T. Odaty
Graphic.