Macon beacon. [volume] (Macon, Miss.) 1859-1995, 1888-09-08
GRANMA'S NEW HOUSE.
a Surprise Prepared For a Dear
Old Mother.

The folks out here have had enough
TO do this summer watching and work
ing over their crops Of hay and barley
and corn, praying for rain to fan and
for rain TO cease, carrying butter and
eggs TO market, and 20 forth. But
they have taken time every now and
then when they have met at the store
to talk over the matter Of Timothy
Bottoms new house. il Is the first new
house that has been built in Tamarack
In fourteen years, and it is a serious
matter. There are big, strapping
boys here doing mems work who
neve saw a yellow shingle before in
their lives. They have been suppos-
ing all along that shingles were always
OF that dull, drab, weather color that
they appear to be on the old houses.
And they never knew before that "A
shingle was a foot and a half long.
How could they know it when they
had never seen more than four inches
Of one In their lives?
What are they thin at one end for?:"
asked Deacon Bibb's boy one day.
"So's the water'n run Off, replied
one Of the carpenters.
"Oh, yes" said the boy, and he does
not know to this day why the carpcn-
ters all haw-hawcd so loudly.
The way Tim came to build the new
house was: His mother, Gran'ma Boil
ton, as all the folks call her, went back
East last spring to visit around among
hersisters and the few old friends that
were still alive in Vermont-to Sec
them all once more before they died.
as she said. 1t was Tins doings.
Gran'ma didn't believe she could ever
in the world make up her mind to take
such a long trip and be away from
nome n whole summer, but Tim j. "A
Po-ahcad fellow and when he set his
mind on it last fall it was pretty sure
to come out that way. Tim had been
to the city Il good deal. and clear to
New York once, and the world didn',
seem 50 big to him as it did 10
eran'ma, who had lived right here in
the old house since long before Tim
was born.
Well, gran'ma got away early in
April and in less than Il week Tim had
some carpenters out from the CITY and
they began to tear the old house down
and pile it in the pasture lot back Of
the barn. Tin. who is an old bach,
slowed the furniture away in the
buggy-room and went over TO Aunt
Becky Todd's to live till the new house
was done. Every day he was on hand
doing more work than any two Of the
carpenters, for, said he:
''lt's just like mother to come pok-
ing back here before the times IN and
] want to have every thing ready so as
to give her Il genuine surprise"
Tins IA good son." said all the
folks.
There amt many a boy that'd skite
Ground the world as he has and come
back and stick to his ma and not
marry, said job Harding one evening.
as a lot of the men were sitting on the
big platform in front of the store.
mo. Look at Gus NORTH said
Charley Gibson; "went of and left his
ma and sister TO look out for them
selves and wrote to his sister that he
was too busy to come to his mas fu-
neral"
YES" said jim Mason, land sent
fifteen dollars to buy flowers with
when flowers was as cheap as dirt and
his sister wanting bread, to say
nothing Of black clo'cs.n
"But Tim never got so heightened
he couldn't come back and keep the
old farm up. or course he likes TO
have things, nice, and that's all right.
lie can afford to have a new house and
he ought to have it,"
And that big room with the what
d'ye-call-it-that window that bulges
out-that's for Gran'ma Bolton, and
it's the best room in the house by all
odds"
SO they talked on and whitfield the
edge OF the platform away evening
after evening, Sometimes a discus
sion arose us to what particular idea
Tim had in putting this or that hole in
the side or this or that crook In the
roof; and then they would all shut
their knives and get up and kick out
their legs and mosey over to ask Tim
about IL, for he was always to be found
working at the house until dark. :
BY and by the house was closed in and
all but one OF the carpenters went away.
Then some plasterers came, then u
w%agonload Of windows. with big panes
glass in them, only two panes to one
and after that some doors-one
Of them OF real black walnut, with al
silvcr-looking plate and ''Mrs. Sarah
Bolton" cut into 1t. And they put a
bell right In the middle OF the door--a
new kind OF bell that rings by a crank
of a knob and wire like Tom
Judson's;