Ashtabula weekly telegraph. (Ashtabula, Ohio) 1880-1886, 1880-07-09
HER WEDDING DRESS.


"STITcH, stitch, stitch, band and gus
set and seaml-But what in the world
shall do for a wedding dressp" cried
Laura, suddenly, looking up from her
sewing with a face of amused trouble at
the other two.
Aunt Desire raised her eyes from her
needle. "Be thankful enough for your
weddin', child" she said, sOlemnly.
''I'veknown girls asn-but here a glance
of appeal from two soft eyes opposite
sent her back to her tucks with her sem
tence unfinished.
"Thankful for my wedding, indeedl"
saucily returned unobservant Laura.
"Not II leave the thankfulness TO
Arthur altogether, Aunt Desire"
"The ghtheadedness of young girls
nowadays is amazin', D." sighed Aunt De-
sire. "'Twan't so in my time. Well,
well, Laury, maybe when you're settled
and got young family round you"
Laura made up her ruffling into ball,
and, throwing it at Aunt Desire, beat
precipitate retreat. Margaret followed
her out.
"Come to my room, DEAR" she said.
"I want to show you something"
Upstairs in her chamber Margaret led
the way to tall old cabinet-bureau, and
taking out key from her bosom, un-
locked the deep drawer. On her knees
there, her lips moving she looked,
Laura thought, almost as if she were
praying.
Out of the oavernous recesses of this
lower drawer she took a fiat, square
package, wrapped in folds of yellowish
paper. From this dull envelope, like
butterfly from its chrysalis, came flutter
of white that made kind of moonlight
glimmer in the warm daylight of the
window, as the folds of shining, undu-
lating silk slipped over her arm. Laura
gave little scream of admiration.
"I never saw any thing 80 perfectly
lovely, never! Why, Cynthia Wilson's
was cotton rag to it. You never got
that hereP P''-she checked herself, and
looked doubtfully at Margaret, whose
fingers were stroking it softly, with
something of that reverent tenderness
with which one touches a garment of
the dear dead.
"No," she answered, absently, ''it
came from far, far away" She looked
up, and met her sisters eyes, when the
past yielded to the present. "You
know, Laura, " she said, quietly, "I was
to have been married once, at Just about
your age, too. He was a sailor, he was
drowned"
Laura olasped her hands on her sis.
ter's shoulder, and the tears came into
her eyes. She wondered at Margaret's
calmness. To the quick girlish heart
on the eve of a marriage-day, this
trouble seemed utterly impossible to be
lived through.
"The last time he came home," con-
tinued Margaret, after awhile, she
brought me this. shall never need il
now, you know" she half smiled, sand
you do"
"Whatl" interrupted Laura, ''I rot
you of the last thing he ever gave you,
your own wedding dress, tool Why,
would rather stand up to be married in
white cotton at ninepence yard" she
ended, after her own fashion finishing
with smile what she had begun with .
sigh.
F' You need not feel like that about it.
dear" said Margaret, fondly. sit il
what have meant all along, so it will
give me no pain to see you wear it.
only wish you may be as happy in it a!
once hoped to be.n
''1 wish 1 might be half as goodl'
cried Laura, the tears in her impulsivI
eyes again. But they were not from {
very deep spring. Before long this new
cid treasure, so opportunely sent, as i
seemed, from over the seas to her, haC
become more part of her own life-story
than of her sisters, who, she thought
could not now care so very much, o
course, or she would not have parted
with it. Nor were Aunt Desires an
swers by-and-by calculated to set he
right, for the romance in Aunt Desire
nature was hidden under most unro
mantle semblance, and she could no
have talked sentiment to save her life
So it was in the most matter-of-fact wa,
that she related the story, of whicl
Laura's thoughtless girlhood had onl,
the vaguest outlines, of the life of patien
toll that went down suddenly without
parting word to love and hope, half
dozen years before.
"Oh, poor Margaret" cried Laura
"and just before her wedding-day, too
What did she doPn
"DoI" shifted Aunt Desire, "why
just that, kept doin', right along. She
found work enough to her hand, as folk
mostly do if they'll only take notice
Why, where'd you hev ben yourself
child, eff it hadn't ben for her bringin
upP a peeked little cretur neve
thought TO be maxim her weddin
things for And now you're your siste
right over again-on the outside, at an
rate"
"Now, If you're going TO be impolitC
Aunt Desire" cried Laura, rising wit
a flushed face at the sound of footste
outside, "I shall go and complain t
Arthur"
"And of course he'll take your par
right or wrong-now," said Aunt d.
sire, expressing, in one cOmprehensiv
sniff, some scorn and considerable syn
pathy. So she went onwith her telling
while the lovers walked up and dow
outside, till it grew too dark even fc
plain seams, and Margaret came dow
to call Laura from the fragrant dusk {
the porch, where the night air was &c
ting heavy and damp.
Margaret and Laura Brooks were o.
phans in straitened circumstance
They mad not always been poor, fC
their father had been well-to-do farm
er, whose crops and cattle had brougl
him in a good income. But series