The Portland daily press., 1884-12-24
Boston TravellerJ
Mary Martins Christmas Eve.
By EDWARD E. HALE.


''She must be good girl; she must be
neat and quick and tidy; she must not use
bad language; and l like TO have them pret-
ty, or reason ably pretty"
Such was the request made by the excel
lent Mrs. Shepard, as she sat, weary from
walking. in the reception room at the Or
phans' Home.
II have heard you say that before" said
Mrs. Metcalf, the good-natured matron,
"and | have heard ten thousand other peo-
pie say it. So daresay you have heard my
joke, that you had better 60 to some institn-
ton where they keep young angels"
Mrs Shepard laughed, as she bad laughed
at the same joke before; and, as she was
a little rested, the nine girls at that moment
under the roof, were brought in.
But, to say The truth, they were not an at
tractive ''lot,o as Mrs. Metcalf, alas, would
have cassed them. She had done her best.
The frocks were clean, and the hair was
prettily arranged. Mrs. Melcalf had changed
all their names. There was not CYNTHIA
Ann nor Bridget nor Polly among them
all. Every child was named Maud or Alice
or Constance, or by some 9th name which
might please a sated fancv. They had neat
stockings aud tidy, even jauntY, little boots
Their hands were clean, and good many
VI GuOuJ uAu d lttlo COQuctbiSu dlf, WHICH
intimated that neat clothes were doing
them good, and that they were waking tc
the knowledge that it is the business of at
least one sex to try to please, whatever may
be said of the other. But, on the other
hand, smallpox had done it's worst with
some. Bad beer and whskey, has, had had
their way with others. With others, there
was certain hang dog air, which showed
only too well how they had been kicked
about by such relatives as they had, before
they appeared in this "Home," which was
so far happy that here nobody pretended tc
be relation.
One by one the girls came into the parlol
and talked with Mrs. Shepard, and one By
one they went out and talked about her
When the last child had gone, Mrs. Shepard
said, rath5r wistfully, to the patient official,
who had been displaying these goods as best
she could:
''They look nicely, poor little things, but,
somehow, do not fancy any of them
Where is the girl saw on the fence as |
came in?''
"Oh the fence?"
This was Mrs. Metcalf's exclamation, and
Mrs. Shepard knew that she had made a
mistake-that to climb the fence was a
crime
"Well, do not take me up" she said. 81
should not have said on the fence-by the
fence, in the garden"
Mrs. Metcalf's brow cleared. "That was
Mary Martin. She has only been with us
two daysp
"Will you call her in? liked her face"
Mrs. Metcalf coughed. She even blushed.
''Why-really-dea Mrs. Shepard-she-
has not beer well brought up. She came
bsck from Ashby yesterday, aud she came
back from Bernardston the week before
She is healthy aud good-natured and willing,
and strong, but-but-they tell me she lies,
and steals and swears sometimes, and-and
that she uses bad language.
The truth is, she never remembers her
father aud mother. She never had any.
She was brought up in poorhouse in Rhode
Island, and they were so good to her that
she wants to go back there. But of course
she can't 60 back, because size is old enough
TO earn her living"
'Does she swear very badly?" asked poor
Mrs. Shepard, who was afraid Of compro-
missing her church membership.
sTo tell the trnth, never heard ber say
anothing worse than deuiL, but Mrs. Goss-
she is the Bernardston lady-says she swears
all the time."
But, as the reader knows, the woman whe
hesitates is lost. Mrs. Shepard had liked the
pleasant smile of the girl who was astride
on the wall of the home as she went in She
asked to have her sent for, and the result,
which is all that the reader need care for,
was that In the three p. m. .rain for Beding
ton crossing Mrs. Shepard and Mary Martin
went together.
1.-The trustees are very particular about
their going to school," said Mrs. Metcalf, as
she tied the girls scarf round her neck and
bade her goodby.
''Never fear" said Mrs. Shepard, "she
shall go to school enough-whenever it's
convenient" she added as a savo TO her
conscience, as she went down the steps.
Mrs. Metcalf heard the FIRST part, and if
she heard the second she never reported it
to the trustees.
A nice time had Mrs. Shepard with Mary
Martin through the next week. 1t was net
convenient to send her 10 school; for the
school was two miles away, and the snow in
the road was scarcely broken, and the men,
folks were hauling wood. The girl was ac-
customing herself to chop mince- meat, to
feed hens, TO skim milk, to work rotary
churn, to sprinkle and iron clothes, and to
do ten thousand other things in that wo-
mans work which is "never done''-from
which duties she did not shrink. ''She is
awful spry," said Mrs. Shepard to her hus-
band when he asked for verdict. But as
to the tricks of language, the candid hearer
had to acknowledge that her reference to the
enemy of souls were too frequent. AS to
veracity, there we're occasions when it
seemed as If she had been trained in some
school of very low sophistry, if, indeed,
she had not been left without training in
that poorhouse from which she graduated.
Honesty in deed, however, was what Mrs.
Shepard clung to as the centre of life. When
one day at dinner she cut through what was
N cant TO be mince pie, when the crust in
stantly fattened beneath the edge of her
knife, when it appeared that there was no
'mince" then it was revealed to Mrs. Shep-
ard what was meant by Mrs. Metcalf and
the lady from Bernardston, who had said