The New Bloomfield, Pa. times. (New Bloomfield, Pa.) 1877-188?, 1881-06-14
Miss Higgins Man.

TOR thirty years Miss Higgins had
looked under the bed every night
and had never found man there, yet
still she looked. Whether it was fear
that impelled that deathlike research or
fatality that was beckoning her to her
fate, know not. 1t would Seem, how
ever, to be the former, for she had often
been heard to observe; -" That of all the
denominations on earth, man was the
most abominable."
Indeed, at the informal tea drinking
of the allied forces of Chesterville, the
three Misses Wheeler and the two Misses
Jones, she had often excelled them all
in the whitening tone with which she
would repeat: Man man ~ and no
one could breathe greater, defiance at
this foeman than she. 1t was at one of
these tea parties that they had entered
into a solemn compact that, in the event
of Woman's Rights giving either of
these allies sovereign power over the
nation, an Eastern law was to be by
them imported and improved, and hus-
bands burned with the dead bodies of
their wives.
AS Eunice Higgins well remarked:
That would put an end to widowers
pretty lively" And with this remark
the Hyson flowed, and the wassail went
on-with such a spirit that, Aurelia
Wilder, the most radical, added another
clause: "That the children of widowers
ebouId ho tbroyn In too opd not ha a
botherin' other women" This was
also we'll received.
Now if any one thinks that Miss
Eunice Higgins was woman devoid of
virtues and womanly graces, 1 pity
them-they are so utterly Mistaken
She had assisted drunken father
through the world, till he made his
exit-sustained and supported feeble
mother-and three or four children
older but more helpless than she, till the
mother went home to her reward, and
the children had found flourishing
homes for themselves, with the excep-
ton of the oldest son, who had followed
his fathers foot steps, literally. Indeed,
when one contemplates the specimens
of manhood she had been most familiar
with, her aversion to the sex does not
seem so wonderful. She was not shrew-
eyed, but good and kindly looking. No
home was brighter than hers. No farm
better managed.
The night on which commences my
humble history, Miss Higgins went to
1Nor In,
had had tea party. The allies had all |
been present, and admitted unanimously
that such fragrant tea, such snowy
biscuits and honey, such golden butter,
such cakes and sweetmeats had not been
partaken of that season. The scene of
her benign victory rose before her as she
took off the little switch of hair at the
back of her head, and pensively rolled it
up ere she put it in the top bureau
drawer.
She saw again the sinking sun shin
ing in, through her house plants in the
window, upon the crimson drugget OF
the dining room; the snowy tea table
with its silver and pink sprigged china
the admiring faces of her friends as they
partook of her delicious food. But one
memory disquieted her. "She almost
mistrusted her lemon extract was losing
its strength-the frosting on the fruit
cake didn't seem to be favored quite
enough" But this haunting manner
was softened by the thought that "she
could get new bottle tomorrow"
BY this time she was arrayed In her
long white night dress and night cap.
She folded up every article of clothing,
and laid it down at right angles, she