Centre Democrat. [volume] (Bellefonte, Pa.) 1848-1989, 1882-03-02
NV Great-Aunt Elizabeth.

As l can remember my great-aunt
Elizabeth I was a very little boy
when | used to see her-she was a we'll
rounded old Quaker lady with the neat.
est of caps and spotless kerchief
folded across her breast. What most
impressed me was that she knitted gray
woolen stockings all the time, appar.
emily never looking at them and never
dropping a stitch. This struck me as a
very marvellous feat, and to tell the
truth I must still think it so, as l do
not find ladies young or old nowadays
who can do the same.
never imagined that my great-aunt
Elizabeth had experienced a ivelier
emotion than that consequent on drop
ping a stitch or having 4 baking spoil.
Not till long after she was laid away in
one of the tombless mounds in the
Friends burying ground did l learn
from some old letters and papers what
q whirlwind of passion and of pain had
swept through her life half a century
before / saw her.
She was the youngest daughter Of my
ancestor, her father, who, with due re-
spect to his memory, must have been a
oholeric and tyrannical old fellow. She
grew up beauty, and as at that lime
marriages were formed early among the
settlers of Upland where the family
lived, her sisters we're soon carried of
and she lived alone with her father,
then n widower. Naturally she did not
lack admirers, some from the surround.
ing farms and some even from Phila-
delpLia and Newcastle. Two, however,
were particularly assiduous; the one,
John Hatton, already the prosperous
owner of alarm in tho neighborhocd,
the other Thomas Ellsworth, q promis.
ing spris OF the law from Newcastle.
The latter was a dapper gentleman Of
the day, with a wig and black silk
stockings, and with the courteous mau-
ners of the Established church, OF
which he and his parents were mem.
bers. be showed to great advantage in
Elizabeth's eyes in contrast to John
Hatton, a heavy youth, slow Of speech,
wearing an ill.ftting Quaker suit Of
homespun, and inclined to surliness.
But her father looked at matters differ
emily. He had feigned business in
Newcastle and found the Ellsworth fam.
lily to be, as he expressed it, Of the
Maryland style of people, spending
their incomes in fine living, buying
wines and wearing imported goods.
Altogether the future Of young Ebs-
worth looked to him very problemati-
cal, 80 one evening he began:
Elizabeth, I see thee has two fol.
lovers who are coming often; l shall
not urge thee to marry either, but /
shall toll thee one thee shall not marry,
and that is Thomas Ellsworth. Nor
shall he co ne again into this house. l
shall have no sparks in silk stockings
enter my dooro"
Elizabeth knew we'll the hard inhexi-
BILE character Of her father. She could
never remember to have sat on his
knee. nor TO have kissed him. Yet she
knew that in his way be loved his fam.
ily before all else, and what rendered
her case hopeless was that II Was this
very love for her that prompted kiI
cruel action. She turned deadly pale
and sinking on bench said not a word
Her father had expected passionate
remonssrance perhaps, but not silen
acquiescence. He we'll knew that he
affections we're for Ellsworth. Man!
men would have worked themselve
into q rage to justify their harshness
But be needed no such self-deception
He acted as Friends usually act, will
perfectly clear convictions.
"Thee knows that in this I ACT TO
thy welfare. cannot allow thee Il
enter . kmily where the hours ar
passed in worldly pleasures, where r.