The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1875-05-13
Am Old style Grandmother.

There Is an OlQ KlCCneu somowAoAo - w
mast. and. an old-fashioned fireplace therein,
with its smooth, old jambs OF stone, smooth
with many knives that have been sharpened
there, smooth with many little fingers that have
dung there. There are handirons, with rings
in the top, wherein many temples OF name nave
besn builded with spires and turrets Grim
SON. There is broad, worn hearth-broad
enough for three generations to cluster on
worn bY' feet that have been torn and bleeding
F,v the Way, or been made beautiful" and
walked on floors of tesselated gold. There are
tones in the corner, wherewith we grasp q coal,
and "blowing for little life" lighted our first
candle; There is q shovel, wherewith was drawn
forth the glowing embers, in which we saw our
first fancies and dreamed our first dreams; the
shovel with which we stirred the logs until the
sharks rushed up the chimney as if forge were
in blast below, and wished we had so many
lambs. or so many marbles, or so many some
things that we coveted, and so it was that we
wished our first wishes.
There is q chair-a low, -bottomed chair;
there is little. wheel in the corner, big wheel
i'm the earret, a loom in the chamber There
are chests full of linen and yarn, and quilts of
rare patterns and samples in frames
and everywhere, and always, the dear old
vrinkled face of her whose firm elastic step
mocks the feeble saunter of her children's chill
dren-the old-fashioued grandmother OF twenty
wears ago. She, the very Providence OF the old
horaestead; she, who loved us all, and SAID she
wished there were more OF US to love, ana 1ook
alFthe children at the old school-house in the
hollow for grand children besides. A great ex-
pansiye heart was hers, beneath that WOODEN
gown, or that more stately bombazlne, or that
sole heirloom of slken texture. -
We can see her to-day, those mild blue eyes,
with more beauty in them than time could
tonch. or death could no more than hide-those
ewes. that held both smiles and tears within the
faintest call of every one of us, and soft reproof
that seemed not passion but regret. A white
tress has escaped from beneath her snowy cap.
She heightened the tether of vine that was
strayine over window, as she came IN, and
ulucked a.. four-leaved clover for Ellen. She
sits. down by the little wheel; a tress is run
Ming through her fingers from the distaf's dis
heyeled head, when small voice cries "Grand.
ma:s from the old red cradle, and "GrandmaP' r.
shouts Tommy from the top of the stairs
Gently sshe lets go the thread, for her patience
is almost as beautiful as her charity, and she
touches the little red bark e moment, till the
Young yoyager is in dreamland again, and then
directs Tommy's unavailing efforts TO mar
ness the cat. 's
The tick of the clock runs faint and low, and
she opens the mysterious door and proceeds to
wind it up. We are ell on tip-toe, and beg ID
a breath to be lifted up one by one and allowed
TO look in for the hundredth time upon the
tin cases of the weights, and the poor lonely
nendulurn which goes to and fro by its little
dim window; and our petitions are all granted,
and we are all lifted up and we all touch with
the little finger the wonderful weights, and then
she music Of the::wheel is resumed, for grand
mothers dainty fingers are never idle.
Was Mary to be married, or Jane 70 be
wrapped in shroud? So sweetly did she
wreathe the white rose in the hair of the one
that YOU would not have wondered had more
roses budded for company, and so meekly dld
she fold the white hands of the other upon her
still bosom that there seemed to be prayer IN
them there. How often has she STOOD between
as and harm how the rudest of US softened
beneath the gentle pressure of her faded ana
sremulous hand! From her capacious pocket
Hhat hand was ever withdrawn closed only to
s,a onened in our own with the nuts she had
.,athered. with the cherries she had plucked, the
6ittla epa she had found, the turnover she
had baked. the trinket she had purchased tor
us as the product of her spinning, the bless
ing she had stored for us-the offspring OF her
heart. =,
What treasures of story fell from those old
lips; of good fairies and evil; of the old times
when she was girl; but we wondered if ever
but, then, she couldn't be handsomer OF or
we begged her to sing-"Sing us one of the old
songs You used to sing to mother, Grandma
"Children, I can't sing," she always said, and
mother used To lay her knitting softly down aud
the Kitten stopped playing with the yarn on the
floor. and the clock ticked lower in the corner,
and and The fire died out to a glow, like an old
heart that is neither chilled nor dead, and
grandmother sang. To be sure, it would not
do for the parlor and concert room nowadays,
but then it was the old kitchen and the old
fashioned grandmother and the 1a Ialiaa' IN IN
write for the memory Of them, though it is a
handsbreadth to the sunset Her voice was
feeble and wavering, like a fountain just ready
to fail, bnt then how sweet it was, and it
became deeper and stronger Out It Gouu nos o.
grow sweeter. What Joy OF griet II was 20