The Eaton Democrat. (Eaton, Ohio) 1875-1903, 1875-07-08
GRUMBLE ON THE
FARM.
By HELEN ASGELL GOODWIN.

By HELEN ASGELL GOODWIN.
We are back on the farm where my childhood was
spent.
Our riches took wings; it is well that they went.
We are happy princes and busy as bees;
At least all but Johns wife. She sits at her ease,
With novels bemosning her happier days,
While the country folks laugh at her ine-ady ways.
She keeps a canary and lap-dog to cheer
Her self-imposed idleness. Is it not queer
How some women will fold their white hands in
despair
And can't be convinced Of what plainly is true,
That the worst of all curses is nothing to DO;
Or that he who found mischief for idle hands when
The good DR.. Watts lived is still among men,
But John has grown young. He said only last
night
And from my heart do rejoice with my son
In the good this roverse to the children has done.
Gustayus and Lincoln work hard on the farm
And study between whiles. Twill do them no
If they work their own passage to college and
through
And the little ones, healthy and happy and brown,
You could not persuade them to go back to town.
All outdoors" for play-ro if pleasant the day;
If stormy, the garret and barnful OF hay.
The best of the whole is, we do our own work;
No servants to waste things and pilfer and shrk,
And threaten to leave if you think it not right
To ask that 90 first cousin to tea every night.
Though they would do better, fancy for one,
If the mistress herself knew how work should De
done.
OF course we live simply; but even Johns wife
Surprised into frankness, for once in her life,
Said; As far as the food goes"-with her no small
distance
az think this the happcst mode of existence"
But we're "out of society,"" she says. No doubt,
If the literal truth, tis a sorrowful " out"
But what is society? Three-minute calls
On people just like you late suppers and balls,
box at the opera, carriage at viii,
And no limit set TO the milliners bill?
I'd sooner be shut in room with cat,
Or only rose-bush, than go through all that!
Thank God we're not out of society yet;
Every soul that Christ died for belongs to "our
set"
To follow His fashions we earnestly try,
And we shall be like him in % the sweet by and by"
But we're no longer "upper tcn." This fact, as
Young Croesus McIlvan appears to forget,
For he calls on Eugenie about every day.
He is summering near here his friends at Cape
May.
He wanted to marry next fall, or before,
And tried to coax her to teach music no more.
But the scales have dropped off from my gran
daughters eyes,
And she teaches her lover lessen more wise,
Declaring he never shall call her his wife
Till he ceases to lead such an indolent life.
His riches may fly; so himself he must prove
Both able and willing to work for her love.
"Well, then" said McIlyan, I'll follow my bent,
And learn to build houses with Barlow Dent"
His friends can do nothing but talk about him,
And wonder what made him take up such whim.
Architecture was always his hobby, they say;
"But it might be pursued in more genteel way"
Replies the apprentice: " A truce to your pride
Like Jacob, the chosen, work for a bride
One wise as the wise mans ideal of old,
Her price above rubies, outshining my gold"
-[ndeDendeut,