The Columbian. [volume] (Bloomsburg, Pa.) 1866-1910, 1879-09-26
Select Story.
MRS. fAY'S BARGAIN.

John Fay was leaving the breakfast table.
He laid roll of bills beside his wife'-
plate.
The fifty dollars, Annie, promised you
for your new dless'
Fifty Then you have really made it
fifty? What good John! shall be able
to save enough out of it to buy Aunt Maria
a real nice New Years present. There are
very good cloaks, shaggy and warm, marked
down to $40 and Sl2 at Morton & Briers,
and ! am distressed Sunday aiter Sunday to
see her walk iuto church in that old shawl.
| could draw the pattern of it with my eyes
shut, and know that nothing but perversity
keeps it from breaking away on her poor
sharp shouders.'
well, do as you please only make the
most you can of the money. Fifty dollars
do not grow on every bush in these times,
and | should hardly have felt able to give it
to you now but that Morton has been look
ing at one of our steam heaters for his store
though some parties down in Hartford Of
fered him one at a discount. So buy the
cloak of him by all means, if you get
one
And John struggled into his three-years
old overcoat aud hurried away
Little Mrs. Fay turned the bills over and
over in her hand. She had scarcely heard
her husbands last words. 1t was enough
that he could afford to give her the money
and that it was hers to spend. He was her
conscience in regard to money matters. With
the intricacies of business she had nothing
to do. Should she run around to Mrs.
Jupe's at once and talk it over, and fiud out
exactly how to send to New York for sam
pies Of dress doods
The Jupes were stylish people who had
recently removed into the neighborhood
having bought the very large lawn and the
very small cottage with stable in the rear,
which gave an air of elegance to the street
of the pretty New England town where the
Fays lived. Between Mrs. Jupe and little
Mrs. Fay the most intimate relations had
been established. They ran back and forth
at all hours, blind gate having been dis
covered, at the foot OF Mrs. Fay's tiny flow
er garden, which opened directly upon Mrs
Jupe's side lawn.
The latter had already advised in regard
to the new dress. you will never think OF
buying it here she had said. Morton &
Brier's dress goods are so common Every.
body in town dresses the ssme-like mourn
ers at funeral Why not run down to New
York and buy something made up? You
would save it in your dressmakers bill
Run down to New York Mrs. Fay re-
garded a visit to the metropolis as the event
of a lifetime-to be ardently desired but
scarcely to be hoped for. And as for dress
maker, one day for such functionary, fol
the purpose of basting and trying on with
three or four more from Susan James, who
went out for seventy.tive cents-and was
thankful to get that in these hard times
was the limit of her desires.
And so Mrs. Fay had gone home filled
with desire to do this. To send to New
York, to the envy of her less well informed
neighbors To appear in a dress unlike any
thing displayed in the town She was no
ordinarily vain woman, but Mrs. Fay
ambition took fire at this spark of sugges
ton. But Johns countenance assumed
doubtful expression when the plan wa
spread out before him.
Il don't know about that, he said, slowly
DO as you would like to be done by, i
my motto, and how should | like to hav,
everybody in town to run off to Hartford O
New York to buy the goods / offer for sale
Patronize home institutions, Annie spenC
your money where YOU make it, and help I,
| build upyour own town, say. Why, tn,
country is going to ruin for the same reason
Nothing in America will do for people, un
less the maker is shrewd enough to brand i
with foreign mark. We spend all ou
time and strength In gathering dollars to b.
sent out of the country. And what do W
get for them A lot of French fripperie
and manufactured articles which need onl
to stand side by side with our own to sho,
their inferiority,'
'Yes, John, but-the dress ? Exports an
imports are matters to be settled by grave
heads, or to settle themselves.
Buy at Morton & Brier's.' They trad
with me, and should like to turn my mon
/ ev into their bends