The Middlebury register and Addison County journal. [volume] (Middlebury, Vt.) 1883-1885, 1883-05-04
sudden thought sent a flame of color

over her face.
at can't be" she said, half aloud.
inquiringly. IL will keep that out of
my life. 1 won't be a failure! |
won't be- And she rushed up to her
room and locked herself in.
She came down as calm and grave
as ever when the tea bell rang, and
after tea she and Lysander read their
daily quantity of Greek, for Lysander
was pursuing his studies with re-
newed avidity since he had a compan-
ion to help him, and had not vet given
up his long-cherished hope of studying
for the ministry, though there seemed
no prospect of his being able to leave
the farm.
After that day Miss Barton devoted
herself more ~zealously than ever to her
work. She darned no more stockings.
When she was not writing her sermons,
she was visiting the sick and the poor,
and making, or suggesting and induc-
ing others to make, improvements,
sanitary and moral, as well as religious.
"She was as practical and efficient as
If she was not a woman" many people
said; and old Jeremy Grimes, who had
wished to tell her when she came that
they didn't want a woman preacher,
said: They couldn't have had such
women in st. Paul's time, or he never
would have written what he did"
But Mrs. Hewitt had a grievance.
Miss Barton didn't seem to make her
self n of the family as she used to-.
She was shut up in her own room al
most all the time now, and she and
Lysander didn't seem to get along
together as they used to. She never
came into the kitchen and wanted to
help make cake now, or sat with them
around the fire in the even ng while
Lysander read aloud. She "didn't
seem to have anything against them,
but she wasn't free and sociable any
more"
Lysander was teaching school this
winter and attending to the farm work
in his leisure time. His habit of study
ing with Miss Barton had gradually
died out. To his mothers persistent
questionings Lysander replied that
neither of them had any time for it
now.
Mrs. Hewitt could not make it out.
Pa" who prided himself upon being
long-headed, limited that he could, but
he would not say outright what he
thought, and his wife regarded his
hints with lofty scorn.
One afternoon, after school hours,
Lysander went down to the woods back
Of the house to superintend the opera
tons of some men who were cutting
timber. Just at dusk Miss Barton,
coming home from a visit to a sick
~parishiOner, encountered four men
carrying on an %improvised stretcher
Lysander's apparently lifeless body.
He vas lying white and rigid, and
there were scarlet spots upon the snow
all the way that he had come. Down
on her knees in the snow fell Miss Bar
ton, and threw her arms around him.
"Oh, my love! my Lowell have you
gone so far away that you cannot hear
me say 1 do love you?' she cried. CT
was cold and hard because 1 thought it
was my duty, but if you could only
come back"
And then they had to raise Miss
Barton and carry her into the house,
for she had tainted.
"That's Just what 1 could have told
you a good while ago if l had had a
mind to-" sad pa" as lie rehearsed
the scene to his wife an hour after
ward. "She's a terrible sight like a
woman if she is a minister. And
Lysander-well, 1 calculate he won't
complain of having his foot cut, if it
does lay him up for q while. | can't
say whether she'll let him do the
preaching, or whether they'll both do
it, but you'll see them married before
summer"
81 don't want anybody to think it's
because Pm a woman" said Miss
Barton, rather inconsequently, when
Lysander led her, blushing and tear
full, to his mothers arms. but L
didn't seem able to help it. And Ly-
sander says | needn't give up my
work."-Bdzar.