Orleans County monitor. [volume] (Barton, Vt.) 1872-1953, 1878-04-08

herF sing us to sleep T.
Tie storm set in hard toward mid
night 1t beats heavily here upon the
Office windows, as you see, ma'am and
we get pretty clean sweep of the wind,
on account of the street running to the
wharves. sent down once to ask how
Doherty seemed but the officer reported
that she vas quiet, and he wished the
rest were. They'd all set in, men and
women, he said, in concert, crying out,
"Sing us to sleep, Doherty r
Pretty soon she began. | could hear
her plain above the roaring of the storm.
She began-Doherty began-that-that
poor-miserable creetur-she that had
cree been woman like other women
folks-excuse me. ma am; but she'd
been on our books a good many years.
And I've heard her sing such things 1
never looked to be taken by surprise as
Doherty took me. You're not surprised
very easy in such place as this at any
thing your fellow-sinners do.
But about midnight, when the storm
was at its thick and the cells were grow
ing still, Doherty, she sat up and began
to sing hymn. She sang:
''shall we gather at the riverg
My boy sings that at Sunday school,
and my wife, she strikes it up the first
thing on the cabinet organ every Sunday
night. Doherty sang it all through:
"At the margin of the river.
Washing up its silver spray,
We will walk and worship ever
All the happy, golden day."
Those are the words. | thought per-
haps you wouldn't know them. Folks
sing them a great deal in the Baptist
church.
Before you could have cooked pistol
it was as quiet as the grave all through
this place. The officers looked at one
another. All the men walked up. The
women then got together in heap about
her. The Cap'n said to me, "Doherty's S
singing hymn tunes p l said l thought
we'd go down and see, and down We
went.
When we looked in at the grating, |
wish, ma'am, you could have seen those
men-ragged, rough, drunk. Some of
'em taken In awful crimes. No; [ don't
wish you had seen them. But there they
sat, as silent as row of angels on the
judgment day, listening to hear that
woman sing. One and another, they
said, "-ush hush p And one fellow
said. 81 used to sing that song myself. /"
He was up for assault and battery. Bad
ly beaten, too, himself, about the face
He crept along the wall, l noticed, or
his knees, to get where he could hear hel
better. When she stopped, he hollerec
out:
"Give US some more, Doherty ~
And the rest said:
"Doherty, give us another psalm
tune !"
But one of the women said:
Come, Nell, sing us to sleep wit
the hymns
; So then she began again; and sh
; gave it to 'em, one upon another, fas
, and clear. Heaven knows where th
creetur learned 'em. At some Protest
ant Sunday School, maybe, where sh
wandered in at holidays They go
good deal on account of the Christina
r presents.
We all got round her there-the me
inside and the officers without-and lii
tened for awhile. | don't think | eve
D heard her sing so in all my life. Dohel
r ty had fine voice, and no mistake.
r she'd been respectfully born she'd hay
!, been a great singer, that woman, | TAX
it; and folks would have been runnir
a to the opera and concert halls to he;
t her.
v So there she sat and sung. She s.
up in one corner, with her chin upon b,
" hands, and noticed nobody but stare
straight on before her. She sang, "Nea
it er, my God, to Thee" and depths
Mercy and she sung, II heard Il
=, voice of Jesus say" and "Love at Home
7. and all those. And all the men and q
Is the women listened. And saw t
1T Captain draw his hand across his eye
II And I'll own it was too much for me.
a will. indeed.
re To see her there. letting out those b
lie ly words so trustfully, as you might sa
he ma'am, as If she had as much right
ne EN- as anybody-that-poor-wretch
te madam, it was enough to break 20
er heart to hear her. I couldn't help j
membering how pretty she had been a
be young, and how she took on the Fl
k night she ever came to US.
d, Pretty soon come away up stairs
for she unnamed me so, before the me