Weekly Chillicothe crisis. (Chillicothe, Livingston Co., Mo.) 1878-19??, 1878-10-03
MlsrsAanw.
MISS ASIIBELL.

CONSERVATION was depicted ON the faces
of the family group assembled to hear it,
when finished reading the letter had
just received from aunt
The group consisted Of myself-Alaly,
eldest daughter of the house and hearth
brown, dmk-cycd, tall, and eighteen;
Helen, not quite so brown, hazel-cyed,
almost us tall, and sixteen; Will, brown
er, dark-eyed, head shorter, and ten;
and Carol, towering above us all, blue
eyed, fair-haircd, gOlden-mustached and
twenty-One.
Aunt was, in fact our grcat-aunt sis.
ter Of our fathers mother but the only
aunt, great Or little, that we had ever
known. We had met her but two or
three times during our lives, as she lived
in far away Illinois, and was too much Oc-
cupied with grains and herds to think of
frequent visiting, and wc-wcli, we were
too poorly provided with gold and silver
to be able to take long and expensive
journeys. So what little visiting there
had been had been on amt's side, with
one exception and then I was the visitor.
1t was when was about fifteen this short
but memorial visit took place. Yielding
to aunt's repeated solicitations was
her namesake-I started from home with
the intention of spending the summer
months on the Illinois farm. | arrived
there safely, was welcomed heartily, and
entertained right royalty; but before a
week had passed away | had grown so
tired of the seeming boundleSsncss of ev-
erything, and lOnged so for the little cot
tage and Lilliputian garden where grew
my three rOse-buShes-On red one white,
and one Il creamy yellow-that aunt see
ing the longing in my eyes, said, Child,
you must go back, and back came long
before was expected, but my dear faith
cr and mother assured me not moment
too soon.
We children had always heard twice Il
year from amt-Oncc collectively at
Christmas, and once respectively on our
birthdays-and each time the kindly note
which exhorted us to "be good mdustri.
Gus and selt-reliant,' inclOscd check
larger or smaller, according to aunt's
gains of the preceding year. These
notes we had been taught to answer with
many wishes for the old lady's welfare,
and thanks for her kindness, and hopes
for speedy meeting; in short, in man
ner beftting the only neiccs and nephews
of the Carmody family when replying to
the friendly epis .es of their only aunt, to
say nothing of that aunt being the wealth.
lest and most influential member of that
family.
A few days before our father died he
called us together and said: MY chill
dren, it isn't at all likely to occur, but if
ever aunt should ask favor of you,
grant it at no matter what inconvenience.
She has been my best and dearest
friend.
Poor father! suspect aunt had often
helped him out of pecuniary difficulties.
He was an impractical, dreamy sort of
man, fond of birds and poetry and flow
ers, and didn't succeed very well in lie.
But, in spite of his dreaminess and want
of worldly tact, and his being so totally
unlike her in most ways, he was Il great
Iavorite of aunt's, and when we tele-
graphed his serious illness to her she left
her vast possessions without Il captain at
moments notice and hastened to his side,
making her appearance in Il bonnet that
Immediately suggested the praires, it was
so unlimited as to size and so bare of or
nament, and which grotcsquely obtruded
itself into the remembrance of that sad
time forever after
Since fathers death things hadn't been
very bright with us. In fact, they hadn t
, been bright at all.
We found there was good deal of
money owing and what remained of the
$500 aunt gave us on the day of
the funeral-she bade us good Bye the
instant the ceremonies were over-after
our very cheap mourning was paid for,
went to the butcher, grocer and shOemak-
er.
We were all willing to do and all did.
whatever we could toward supporting the
household but, dear dear! talk about
weeds! | never saw anything grow like
bills.
Carol, who had an artistic turn of
mind, struggled with it, and |, who had a
dress-making turn of mind struggled
with that, and Helen struggled with her
books, hoping to become teacherm time,
and little Will struggled with some one
else's books, for he went to publishing
house as errand-boy-poor fellow!
Besides our struggles, we had mother
on our minds. A few weeks after we lost
our father we lost our baby
sister. A beautiful child she
was, as bright as Il diamond and as fair as
pearl, md the pride and darling of us
all. Already sinking beneath the blow Of
her husbands death, when her little
daughter died too my mothers heart was
nearly broken From being sunny, en-
ergetic, busy woman, she became listless
and apathetic, sitting in her room day af.
ter day gazing upon the pictures Of the
loved ones, Or rocking back and forth, hei
hands clasped before her, looking with
dry eyes upon vacancy.
~, that she could be made to weep!
that she could be reused from this dread.
fui gloom into which she has fallen!" was
our continual prayer, for the terrible
thought came to us often that we should
lose our mother in a much worse wa,
than we had our father and sister-thal
her BRAIN would at last give way beneath
its weight of heavy despairing thoughts.
Well the exchequer was low enough,
and mother had had one other bad spells;
and lady customer had just been in ant
Il.