The Eaton Democrat. (Eaton, Ohio) 1875-1903, 1884-02-28

eOluc VI lueHu lcdhy, tue uOlcS OppSu
with bits of rag, often to be renewed;
the milk-room was in the shed. built
against the chimney that it might not
freeze there in the winter. and only
aired by one Slated window; the churn
was an old wooden one with a dasher,
and ven the 'tspaddle'' with which she
worked her butter was whitfield out of
a maple knot by Amasa himself, and
was heavy and rough.
Then to her belonged the feeding of
the pigs-gaunt, lean animals with sharp
shouts, ridgy backs. long legs and thin
tanks, deep set eyes that cleaned with
intelligent malice and never-sated nun
ger. Wealthy grew almost afraid of
them when they clambered up on the
rails of the pen in their fury for food,
and tapped their pointed ears at her,
squealing and fighting for the scant
fare that she brought. For Amasa un-
deIfed and overworked everything that
belonged to him.
Then there were hens to look after
the l d-fashioned barn-door ~''creepers''
that wanted food, too, and yet catered
for themselves in great measure and
made free with barn and woodshed for
want of their own quarters, and were
decimated every season by hawks, owls,
skunks. weasels and foxes, to say moth
ing ofthe little. chickens on which crows
and cats worked their will if they dared
to stray beyond the ruinous old coop
contrived for them by Amasa's invent
i've genius out of sticks and stones.
Add to all this the cooking, washing,
baking and sewing, the insufficient sup
ply of pork, potatoes and tough pies, the
.'bi'rd dinners" whose strength lay
in the vegetables rather than in the
small square of fat pork cooked with
them, of which Amasa invariably took
the lions share. These accommodating
and never-ceasing labors all wore day
by day on the vitality of Mrs. Tucker,
and when to these were added an an
nual baby, life became a terror and q
burden to the poor woman.
But what did Amasa carep He, too,
worked '.from sun to SUM-"
"He farmed in the hard old fashion
with rude implements and nc knowl-
edge but:
"My father done it afore me, so 1 am
a goin' to do it now; no use talkin'."
One by one the wailing, puny children
were laid away in the yard on top of
Sandhill, where the old fuckers and
their half-dozen infants lay already; a
rough inclosure, full of mulleins, bur-
docks and thistle, overrun with low
blackberry vines and surrounded by a
rail fence. 1t had been much handler
for the fuckers to have a grave
yard close by than to travel
five miles to the mills with
every funeral; and they were not driven
by public opinion in regard to monu-
ments; they all lay there like the beasts
that perish, with but one slant gray
stone to tell where the first occupant
left his tired bones. Two children of
Wealthy's survived. Amasa and Lu-
rama, the oldest and youngest of seven.
Amasa, a ~considerate, intelligent boy,
who thought much and said little, and
Lurana, or 'tLury," as her name was
generally given, a mischievous, self
willed little imp, the delight and tor
ment of her little WORKOUT mother.
Young Amasa was a boy quite beyond
his fathers understanding; as soon as
he was old enough he began to help his
mother in every way that he could de-
wise. And when his term at the village
school was over, to his fathers great
disgust he trapped squirrels and gath:
cred nuts enough to earn him money
and subscribe for an agricultural paper,
which he studied every week till its
contents were thoroughly stored in his
head. Then began that ':noble discon-
tent which the philosophers praise.
The elder man had no peace in his
old-world ways; the sloppy waste of the
barnyard was an eyesore to this s.book-
learned feller," as his father derisively
ao11al h1., Arl fhn nchaS rf fha wood
fire were saved and sheltered like
into a big heap to edify the wandering
hens. That d~esolate garden was
plowed, fertilized, and set in order at
last, and the great ragged orchard
MANFRED, the -apple-trees thinned and
! trimmed, and ashes sown thick over the
old messy sod. Now these things were
not done in a day or a year, but as the
boy grew older and more able to cope
with his fathers self c~onceit, more was
done annually, not without much oppo-
sition and many hard words, but still
done.
Then came a heavy blow. Lurana,
a girl of fifteen, fresh and pretty as a
wild rose, and tired of the pinching
economy, the monotonous work, and
l SEluNlluS llO VI DuC Id u, Idrb away
with a tin peddler and broke her
mothers heart; not in the physical sense
that hearts are sometimes broken, but
the weary woman's soul was set on this
bright, winsome child, and her life lost
all its scant SAVIOR when the blooming
face and clear young voice left her for
ever.
81 don't blame her none Amasey,"
she sobbed out to her boy, now a stout
fellow of twenty-five, raging at his
sisters folly.
81 can't feel to blame her. I know
It's more'n a girl can bear. to live this
way. I've he'd to, but it's been dreadful
hard -dreadful hard. I've wished
more'n once 1 could ha' laid down along
with the little babies out there on the
hill, SOS to rest a spell; but there was
you and Lury wanted me, and so my
time hadn't come"
'tAmasey, you're a man grown now,
and if you should get married, and ]
s'pose you will, men folks seem to think
it's needful whether or no, do kinder
make it easy for her, poor cretur!
Don't grind her down to skin and bone,
like me, dear; ta'nt just right, I'm sure
ont, W to make no more of a
woman than eff she was a horned %critter;
don't do it,"
"Mother, I never will" answered the
son, as energetically and solemnly as il
he were taking his oath.
But Wealthy was nearer to her rest
than she knew. The enemy that turks
in dirt, neglect, poor food, constant
drudgery and the want of every whole,
some. and pleasurable excitement to
mind Or body, and when least expected
swoops down and does its fatal errand
in the isolated farmhouse no less than
in the crowded city slums-the scourge