The Republican journal. [volume] (Belfast, Me.) 1829-current, 1881-03-31
Who Got The MItten

I;Y ROSE TERRY COOKE.
DEAR AUNT Roxy I've had considerable many
calls for mittens this winter mostly they re WOvt
goods, that don't last no time. Its come into my
head that mabbe you'd lust as lives make eetlt
suthin TO buy snuff an handkerchets with ode
INES and reklectln you used to be a master
hand to knit this is for to say that cf you'd fall t.
| and knit lot Of them two-threaded mitens We
set by So why could sell EN- for ye-on com
mission. Eli you're agreeable why drop a line tc
IL Blank st. St Joseph. You its mostly
droyers and seech wants EN-.
''l ours to command JOHN JACKSON "
"The land sakes" calculated Miss
Roxy Blair, as she laid down her spec
tacles after reading this letter. John
was alters the beateree for gumptiOn
alters said he'd make spoon or sple d
horn, an do believe it's the spoon. Well
said I've got full twenty run o blue yarn
| spun last year, an some red: guess
there won't be no white wanted in them
parts. I'll set to an get a lot more red
over to Miss Bilins'S. Wonder ef she'd
get wind ont an go to maxim mitten>
herself she beats all to question folks
up. III tell her I'm agoin' to teach Nance
to knit; and SO | am; faint no lie. Lii
teach her to knit an help on the mittens.
It'll be suthn for her to do nights stead
OF readin' all the newspaper scraps she
can pick up
Nancy Peek was Miss Roxy's bound
girl. The old lady lived alone in a
small brown house on hillside far above
Bassett. a grass grown track ran 10y
the house, through the woods that cloth
ed the hilltop over and away into the
heart of the Green Mountains.
Little Nancy had been bound out to
Miss RoXana only about year when
John Jacksons letter reached Bassett.
Miss Roxy was getting Old: rheumatism
had laid hold of her, and she could not
hobble up and down hill to the village
any longer, SO she resolved to take a
young girl into her house to wait on her.
''TWon't cost a great deal" she said to
herself. ''There's the garden amt half
planted; she can drop potatoes as well
as a man, and hill EN- up too and can
set more beans outside the fence; when
lsr'el comes up to spade the gardin he
can fix up place for more beans and
lngin meals cheap. Fact is, anyway,
dursn't be up here alone no longer, and
hirin some telier or mother to do arrands
would cost mOre'n it would come to.
There's mas old goWndS can be cut over
for her, sech as is too ragged for me-
Having made up her mind, the old
lady persuaded a neighbor who sometimes
drove by her house to mill to take her in,
and leave her at the p0Or-house, which
was on his way, until he came back with
his grist. When he returned he had two
passengers, for Miss Roxy had fixed on
Nancy for an experiment.
"TWas Hobson's choice" she explained
TO Mr.. Tucker, as they drove along
'there WANT no Other gal there. She's
real small, but Miss Simons saws she's
spry an handy, and she ha'nt got nobody
belongin' to her, sost sha'nt be pestcred
with folks a-cOmln round"
In six months little Nancy had become
so useful that she was formally bound
out to the old lady, and now she went to
school in summer half day, and had
learned to read and write tolerably. She
was very lonesome in that solitary house.
There were children at the poor house
whom she played with, tended and loved,
but Miss Roxy had not even a cat and
when Nancy, in the longing of her loving
! little heart, took a crooked -necked squash
out of the shed, tied calico rag about its
neck, and made a dolly of it to be compa
ny for her IN the little garret where she
slept, Miss Roxy hunted it up,-for she
Kept count of everything she had, boxed
Nancys ears soundly, and cut up poor
little yellow Mary Ann, and boiled her in
a pot for pies.
Until tie mitten business began Miss
Roxy found it hard to find enough work
for the cfild's active fingers to do; but
after that she had no trouble in keeping
the little girl busy, as poor Nancy found
out to her sorrow. The evenings of
spring, when she used to love to sit on
the doorstep with her apron over her
head and listen to the frogs peeping in a
swamp tar below, were now spent in
winding hanks OF yarn, or struggling with
stiff little fingers, to slip the loops off one
needle and on to another, her eyes tired
with the dull light of tall0W candle and
her head aching with the effort to learn
and the slaps her dullness earned from
Miss RoXy's hard hands. 1t was worse
as summer came on, and she had to knit,
knit, all the time, with not a minute to
get new posies for her garden Only by
early dawn did she get her chance to
watch the blue liverWort open its sunny
cup; the white eggs of bloodroot buds
come suddenly out of the black ground
the tiny rows Of small flowers that chill
dren call ''Dutchman's breeches" hang
and flutter on their red stems; the azure
sand-vlolet, dancing columbine, purple
cranes bill, lilac orchis, and queer
moccasin flower made that hidden corner
gay and sweet.
Even when school began she had to
work still. Miss Roxy was determined
to send a big box of double knit mittens
to John jackson before winter set in; and
as fast as they were finished they were
dampened, pressed and laid away in the
garret where Nancy slept.
Poor little girl she hated the sight OF
mlttens, and this summer a wild wish
came into her head that grew and grew,
as she sat alone at her knitting until it
quite filled head and heart too.
A child from the city, spending the
summer near Bassett, came now and
then to school as a sort Of pastime, and
brought with her a doll that really went
to sleep when you laid it down; shut its
VI llSllt pl'e eyes, anu never opened tneln
until 1t was taken up
1t seemed to lonely little Nancy that
such doll would be all anybody would
want in the world. If only Nancy had
such dear lovely creature to sleep in
her bed at night, and sit up in the door
beside her while she knit, she knew she
would be perfectly happy but that could
never be. However, after much dream
ing, wishing and planning, one day a