The Cincinnati daily star. [volume] ([Cincinnati, Ohio]) 1875-1880, 1879-08-02
Some Strange Letter Carrier Reports.
Baltimore Every Saturday.l

Meeting the letter carriers as they leave
the postoffice with theiI bulky sacks
crowded with letters, one must wonder
how they can distribute each and every
one to its proper owner: but, bless you!
they go further than that. After they
have been OH route for awhile they can
tell much more about family than they
ever do. They know if one of the chill
dren is away, if visitors are coming, if
any of the relatives are dead, and many
other things hardly known to the nearest
neighbor. An envelope is nothing but
an envelope to you. You may criticisc
the Handwriting and the orthography, but
| beyond that you care nothing. To the
| letter carrier it is book. He knows
when father and mother are coming
where a truant boy is-whether the fami-
ly is respected or not-and Sarahs beau
cannot blind the carrier by getting some
one else to direct the envelope.
One day one OF the oldest carriers had
letter left over after he had gone his
usual round. 1t was directed to woman
| living in little old house standing back
| from the street, and as he studied the ad-
dress he said TO himself that he had never
had an epistlc for her before in all the six
or seven years he had been on that route
The post mark was that of an Office in
the East ana the carrier unused to him
self
"This is from her son, and she will be
crying before | am out Of sight"
He delivered the letter to a white faced
woman OF 90, VINO seemed to be living all
alone, and she looked surprised as he
placed it in her hand.
"a letter for mel haven't a relative
on carth!" she gasped.
But he left it with her.
In about three weeks a second letter
came, and the old lady opened the door
before the carrier was inside the gate
She did not say that it was from her son,
but the carrier knew for all that, and he
hoped that the truant boy had settled
down for life, and was writing cheerful
words and sending aid to his poor old
mother. Regularly every three weeks,
for half year or more, there came a fat
looking letter for the old woman in the
little cabin; and if the letter was a day
late her white face at the window re
preached the carrier more than words
could have done If it was dav earlier
she was at the door to meet him, knowing
his step from ali others which passed that
way.
The other day, when the carrier found
the buff envelope, directed in the old,
familiar, cramped up hand, he said to him
self:
81 will hurry around to-day, for the last
time | saw her she seemed i'll and weak,
and letter will give her new strength"
He opened the gate with bang to give
| her warning, but no white face appeared
at the window, and no hand raised the
door-latch. The carrier knocked on the
| door for the first time, and after moment
a woman opened it and said
"She is dead, and she hasn't relative
in the city"
| Among the letters to go 10 the dead
letter office next week will be one, across
| whose face is written whole chapters in
three words. "Dead-not delivered.n An
old woman has passed away-a cottage is
| dcserted-a letter returned. The world
will see nothing in these simple facts, but
yet in them is contained all the senti-
ment God has ever given to any human
| heart