Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1886-06-04
Gales aud Sketthes.
A MORTGAGE CANCELLED.

Old Peter Harvey was strange man.
After living so years bachelor be aston
ished the little world in which he lived by
marrying little old maid as strange as
himself, and all the little world laughed.
But he was good husband and kind
father to his only child, Annie. After
twelve wears OF married life he and his
wife Elizabeth were called away almost
in an hour. leaving little Annie to sob out
the first great grief of her life.
After the funeral. when Peter Harvey
and his wife had been laid side by side in
the old graveyard. and the stern Covenan-
ter minister had said his few solemn words
of regret for the dead. and comfort for
the living, little Annie Harvey went to
live with her uncle, Andrew Mallory. till
she should become of age.
At twelve years old Annie Harvey was
like a rosebud One fears to see the bud
expand into the magnificent flower, lest
the delicate tints or the exquisite proper
tons may be lost.
Such were the feelings of good Mrs.
Mallory when she SAID to her husband.
IL wish the lassie would just stay the
pretty BARN she is now"
Tut. tut, mither; | mind when ye
we're a wee baird yourself; and who says
we're not comely body moo? said the
sturdy old Scotchman.
Mrs Mallory, delighted with COM
pliment from her husband, went about her
work, remembering the days of her girl
hood in far-away Scotland, when hand.
some andy Mallory, in his Sunday best,
came to court herself, Marian Harvey.
That Annie Harvey should have other
views than her aunt concerning herself is
not strange. She was impatient for the
time to come when she could assume the
long dresses and the accompanying airs
of ripper years, and already she had faint
dreams of the delights of beaux, parties,
dancing and that browning delight. f1rt-
ing.
From twelve to seventeen! How slowly
the years move 1t seems an age in youth
and but a moment in age.
Little Annie Harvey had become Miss
Harvey. She was exceedingly pretty and
she knew it. She also knew that she was
heiress to the lands and money of her
prudent, though odd father. and she had
been told that the money had been doubled
and quadrupled in the careful hands of
Uncle Mallory.
But another thing she had not been told
that would have been pleasanter in her
ears than all this. She certainly had low
ers; but they were such milk-and-water
fellows that she could not, for the life of
her, help thinking of them as she did of
her uncle's oxep-great, harmless, good
natured animal, but so dull.
Among the friends of Peter Harvey
was Robert Wallace, an honest, hard
working man, but singularly unfortunate.
II COW became choked eating turnips.
it was his cow; if boy went to sleep in
meeting. and was marched out in dis
grace, or warned from the pulpit, it was
sure to be his boy. When the minister's
bees swarmed on Sunday, and refused to
90 into the nice new hive, out OF a hundred
heads present they selected his head, and
fought sharply for a resting-place there.
His wife nailed a horseshoe over the
door, and he drove his oxen and horses
with a witch hazel rod, out still the
troubles came. Finally old KeZze Brock
tire salt in his well, and from that day
forward his troubles ceased.
Within an hour after old Kezzie had
settled the witches in the well, Peter Har-
vey came riding down the lane, singing
his favorte song Comm Through the
Rye" sign he was in excellent good
humor After stopping to have a chat
and taking drink of "Glenlivet," with
drop of water from the well, he pro-
posed to Robert Wallace to sell the few
animals and other things he could not take
with him, and emigrate to Illinois; and
drawing out his well-flled pock elbook,
he counted him four hundred dollars tor
the journey.
Great was the Joy of the Wallaces at
this unexpected act of friendship.
But" said Peter Harvey, when he had
written out a note for the money, made
payable when convenient, ''you must give
me security and I'll just take mortgage
on this colt" And he clapped his hand
on the head of one of the half dozen lads
who called Robert Wallace father.
With true scotch humor the mortgage
was executed and recorded, and Robert
Wallace. with his household. started for
distant Illinois.
Like all emigrants to new country. he
had his troubles, but in the end prospered
He owned broad acres. and cattle and
horses in abundance; and, after eight
years on the prairie. he said to his wife:
"When the crops are secured, we will
60 back to old Ryegate. and take look
once more at the green hillocks of YER
mont"
"And mind you cancel that mortgage
and make me free man. said John
Wallace, now young lawyer in Peoria.
I'm thinking the lad intends to marry,
and wants to show clean record" said
his mother laughing.
But Robert Wallace and his wife never
saw their Scotch friends in old Ryegate.
nor the green hills of Vermont. Before
the crops were gathered man and wife
were cut down by the harvester, Death.
and their neighbors laid them side by
side under the trees their own hands had
planted.
John Wallace. the son. with whom his
story has to do, with that restlessness
common to western life. had gone still
further west. and finally located in Den
yer; and there he prospered slowly, as
young lawyers in new places generally
do.
Annie Harvey was ailing.
"A breath of sea air might do her
good" said old DR.. Goodwille; and to
the seashore she went.
The little steamer Rose Standish carried
her load OF passengers safely through all
the winnings of that crooked channel
which leads to the dock of ancient Hing