The Elk County advocate. [volume] (Ridgway, Pa.) 1868-1883, 1882-11-30

| n
one Benoni, the son of my sorrow. and
the other Asher, because of her hap
piness that had been restored to her
with him. And little Ash and Ben,
as they presently were known, grew
and thrived, and ruled the household
with rods of iron. What pretty little
darlings they were, rolling round
the floor in their dimpled play,
their curly yellow heads in
the sun their dark-fringed
eyes, their fathers eyes, dancing with
mirth and mischief; their rosy faces so
velvety soft and sweet. Anstice would
catch one to her heart, and drop him
for the other, and go back to the first,
and hardly let them alone at all, in the
swelling ecstacy of her love, but for
the kicking and struggling and loud
voiced protestations that they set up;
but Margaret would only pause in her
work, and follow them with wistful
eyes, wondering if this was the way
that their father looked at their age,
and silently thanking Heaven, that, if
the father had been taken, it had, at
any rate given them each other.
They needed each other, the little fel-
lows, as they increased their days. They
had nobody else. 1t was long since
Anstice had kept a servant, and, al
thour'l the old furnishing remained in
other rooms, the small family lived
chiefly in the narrow quarters of two,
opening into one another. Neighbors
were scarce in that hill. country. Child
ren did not exist at all. The only per-
son within reach was the man round
the side of the mountain, who managed
Anstice's little farm for her. There
was no school, of course (the nearest
was down in the valley, ten miles
away; no church any nearer way
farers did not fare that way; no
soldiers marching through hammered
streets with music no streets ; no
other torchlight procession than that
of the eternal stars nothing to break
the calm monotony but the mail-coach,
that once day could be seen, a mere
speck, winding down the distant high
way. But it all made no odds to the
children. The day was not long enough
for their pleasure. They knew nothing
of any world outside of their kites and
balls and gardens and birds'-nests in the
lovely, swift summers; their snow
forts and snowshoes and sleds in the
long winters. If it had not been for
their perpetual longing and yearning
for what was not Greta and Anstice
might have felt something like a re-
Election Of their happiness in looking
at them.
"Do other little boys have fathers ?''
asked Ash, one day.
"Only when they don't have
brothers." answered Ben.
"But fathers are nice to have"
reasoned Ash. Don't you remember
the tart the minister over at Bareback
brought us? And he said his little
boy had one"
"Tes. It.had raisins in it. Raisins
are so good!'
but l think I'd rather have a
brother" urged Ash. 1.-The brothers
there next day to play and the raisin
isn't"
"Hear the darlings," said Anstice
"They will be father and brother both
to each other. Oh! and they will have
need of it,
For poor Anstice's age was even
more troubled than her youth had
been. Then she had seen, piece by
piece, the substance of the old estate
depart-farm by farm, field by field
For two generations, except to SOW
and reap the few acres left the home
place, her people had done nothing but
to sell their patrimony, till, at length,
it had reached point where all the
fertile glebe was gone and there was
nothing left to sell. The Porter place
had kept them alive so many years
the Green property so many more
When her father went to college
the sale of the Rye farm paid the
bills-big bills too. When he was
buried the great funeral cost the
barley fields. The long acres down in
the valley had furnished her and John
with food and clothes, after her own
husbands death from the mountain
fever. And then there was no rem
nant of it all, but the home place, that
any one would take so much as q
mortgage on; and it was when she
mortgaged that that John, in despera-
ton, went away to sea.
Anstice had depended on the rent OF
two or three little outlying spots to pay
the interest on the mortgage; and
now, this cruel year, they had been de-
serted by their tenants, who left the
sterile heaps of stone and moss for the
rich Western lands, and there was no
other tenants TO take them. She had
no money; and, come the last part OF
November, the mortgage would be
foreclosed, and she and Greta
and the boys would be
turned loose upon the world,
without dollar. Greta could work,
maybe; but she herself and the lite
lads-there was not even the poor
house before them. Up in that hill
country the abject poor were so few
that they were farmed out and boarded
from place to place. And that was the
end of all the Purcell wealth and Pur-
cell hope. Death would have been a
kind thing to old Anstice in COM
parison.
She used to lie awake in the nights,
thinking over the possibilities. The
horror of them grew upon her. She
would start up and pace the floor, and
ainging something on would run out,
as if to get help from all outdoors-the
stars, the wind, the sky-and end by
wondering, as she leaned over the para
pet of the old stone wall, if it would
| NOT ha hact ta 1,iIt on and m tbapocaIvae