New Orleans Republican. [volume] (New Orleans, La) 1867-1878, 1876-01-16
GEORG DONATION PARTY
BY ROSE TERRY COOKE.

Parsen Wilbur's old house in Noppit wal
Ightened up unusually; you hardly eve,
saw signs os life there except in the bach
windows, where kitchen and ''keepin'
ronm' were one, for Aunt Nancy cOnven
j pr- and the saving of fuel. The parsons
Dom opened from the same general ref
! for the ks of warmth, and Aunt Nan
t., sept on u lounge to be near at hand
there was boy who did chores for these
two old people, BUT he occupied the kitchen
chamber, being used to cold weather, and
not particular about his toilette luxuries, il
only he had only cOmfOrtaDies enough for
warmth. Aunt Nancy was sprightly old
lady Of sixty Wlbur's young
est half sister; for he himself was ninety
two. For ten years he had shared his labors
with colleague, that is he stayed at home
and prayed for his people, and Brother
Smith" preached and visited, aud did all
Noppit is poor place: sparse, mullen
growing, mouldy old village, on top Of a
hill; and Brother Smith bed d small salary,
but Parson Wilbur's al vance was smaller
etilI, and so it had long been the custom to
give him q donation visit once year, to
which people came iIom a.! the villages
about, for he was the lien OF those parts; a
minister settled in one pace in Connecticut
tor ffty-fve years beng almost az rare
there a. q woman who ever got a divorce.
This is why the house was lit up tonight
in every corner; all the bedrooms were
dressed" not only with White spreads on
tho tall beds, and quaint ci.n,z curtains on
the testers, b ut some distant branch OF the
Wilbur tribe, fresh trcm boarding school,
had decked the wry faced looking glase.
and the mourn ing piece done in hair. and
the tall candlesticks, aLd the nigh clock,
with wreaths of ground pine and hemlock
n Al jxS.,t- ,ArNt hQr Ioon
aforesaid beheld therein curiousiy twisted
7ace set in green, that might have passed
for the likeness OF a incorporating taun IT
Noppit people had been classical in their
reading.
Il Vas q bitter November night, dark as
blackncss, and the fires that blazed on every
hearth and kept Aunt Nancy running about
with q brush in terror of enaps and sparks
were welcome to the chilled visitors who
had come miles in cold and darkness. part
" for fun aud partly from habit. Below
stairs all the doors between the rooms were
epen. and "A stove in the paIlor warmed its
chill gen;.tity to an endurable pitch; here
were portraits of the parsOn and his wife
taken at to time when these worthy peO-
pie mast ave been constructed OF sheet
tin; pic,a:es calculated to strike terror
into the isarts of refractory children, and
awe sinners to propriety, it either class
There aere certainly both sorts here to-
nigh {, fer he parson' posterity to the third
gene ration rad gathered in force; there was
Mas Nab Wilbur, eyed three, whose real
name var Mehitable, after the awful female
on the val whose cap and ruff es ard small,
sharp e.ts seemed to glare tieIceiy On the
little yel"w haired mite in cheap hnery be-
Low; cLIid who shrieked, and tretted, and
got under iuut every here. and misbehaved
oanarail, Tia re waS her amt male and
skinny, ana WORKOUT, as became a woman
who had kept district school from fifteen to
TWEEN ty H,,A ihen married poor farmer and
had eigh; children; by Ter sat her mother, a
fat and fair woman OF sixty, very positive
and practical; other descendants were there,
also deacois galore. Deacon Peters short,
lean, tremu!ous, without speak in his voice,
rolling bIue eyes, and a dominant, black
eyed sharp-aosed wife; Deacon Grave, long
and Tank, with a4uiline features and wig,
but such a meek look withal, you knew his
wife, recently deceased, had carefully
trained him, and was now deeply mourned;
You could SEQ how shocked he was once to
catch himself in smile, how he hid it with
= white handkerchief az big as crib sheet,
looked furtvelv about and cOughed. There
was Deacon Coffin, very fair, smiling and
comfortable, with q big watch and chain of
solid silve:, and q chronic cold in his head;
and there was Deacon Gallup, tall and shy,
and eager % please every body, a man to
whom the opinion of other people was q
matter Of liie or death; tOrtures would not
have indeed Deacon Gallup to be dis
honest man-for fear somebody should find
it out!
There was yerybody else and their wives
there, too: tanners with hands rough az the
rocky soi. they wrested with, and faces red
with summer sun and winter winds, men
who wo,le.. SO hard that they did net know
how 10 plss, ~hose Sunday coats were as
pleasa nj 10 Them as strait; JACKIE ts. and VINO
we're, .ne and all, secretly longing for bit
of pine and jack knife, they were 60 unac'
customed TO wearing their hands as an
article OF dress; the wives, too, presented
remar kabe appearances to the eye OF
keen obs, rvers; their hard and lonely
lives knew no more how to blossom than
the potAtoes in their own cellars; they
only spron5ed. and sprouts are not cOmeiy
TO behold To see their dress was to
be affected hysterically, for II induced
tears and laughter both, the struggle for
Fashion ana style was pathetic; the filmsy
Gsdelaine" "a "pop.inette' tortured into
,oyerskirts SO curiously Topped you saw with
rerror that the wearer could not cit down
with safety to the dress; polonaises OF
skimpy cut. olinging helplessiy to figures
most like chestnut rails; fOunces OF frantic
arranpement and cOlOrs-but there, let us
mauea. 8 rainbow would have shuddered
- al sight; happily rainbows do not 60 to
And VET what uVeS were