Milford chronicle., 1885-01-09
LOVE AND POTASH.
Little Romance HinRir~
n Dead Ir- On rho starry AZ
S-urstFs 81 bohemia.


I 'afheFe's what broke up my home and
made me come over to America"
The speaker was an employee in q
large soap factory on the west side. He
was pointing to some drums of imported
soda as he spoke.
81 was born in Bohemia, among the
mountains, in a little village. Our chief
industry was making lye. aud some
times soap. I think half of the people
made their living that way; my family
did. When ] WIS little boy 1 was sent
out every day with my brother and
other little boys to gather leaves and
I twigs. The best were those of the fir,
] but we took everything. We'd build
/ big bOnfres in dry weather, and the
moment the ashes and embers were cold
we'd throw them into bins under low
sheds. Below these sheds were what
you'd call leach tubs. Some of these
were old barrels sawed in half some,
and they belonged to the poorer folks,
were heavy willow baskets. One l re-
member was square, built out of bricks,
with door on the side. We used to fill
the tubs with ashes, and pour as much
water on them as they'd hold. WhA i.
ran through it would run into a shi.e
bucket This was what used to be lye.
1t was too weak to sell or to use to make
soap, and So we'd boil it down. Some
times we'd sell it when it was boiled
down very strong, but generally we let
it boil TIL it was dry. What was left
was good potash, and that wei sell to
rich man in the village, who'd send
loads Of it away to foreign countries. If
the potash was gray we got a good price
for 1t, but if it was red or brown we got
less money and also got a good thrash
ing from our parents.
Down the road was my fathers |
cousin, who was the best soap maker in |
the barony. He made soft soap from /
our potash and common salt. He had /
pretty danghter-shes my wife now, |
and when she was fifteen she was as
good a soap boiler rs her father. was
about seventeen when times began to
grow quite hard. The village merchant
didn't buy as much potash or soap, and
what be did buy he paid less for. And
then the men who'd start out in the
spring with a wagon to peddle the same
wares found things just as bad every
where. We thought It came from the
wars that were going on, and that good
Old prices would come back before long.
When / got to be twenty [ was my
wifes beau, and the old folks agreed
that we should marry two years after
and keep up the family trades in the old
places. Well, we married, but not there,
and I've never been there since.
T. You see it came about like this. I
vent down to the village one day with a
oad of potash and soap, and called as
usual on the merchant For the first
ime be refused tCeA1y the latter, and
,fiered so small a price for the former
hat l began to laugh. But when he
ook ont of box some foreign soap and
,ffered it to me at half the price 1 want
d, and explained 20 me how the French
nd English were making soda and pot
sh in big factories out of rocks that
ost almost nothing, saw that my bus
ness was ruined. The news ran
trough the village, and everybody was t
cry blue. was particularly tlue
hen L thought of Gretchen. Many i
ried to fight it out, but they nearly a
Larved. Most of us wandered away to /
ther countries, and 1 came over to =
merica, where I've been ever since. n
nd a little over a year after l landed 1 a
ent over for my sweetheart, and she a
lme over and we were married. y