Idaho semi-weekly world. [volume] (Idaho City, Idaho Territory) 1875-1908, 1889-12-17
THE DONATION PARTY.
Surprising the Clergyman In the
Rural Districts.
Pork sausagss and Pincushions for q
Dyspeptic DOminie-But the Boys
and Girls Had o Good Time
All the Same.

DySpcptlC DOHnHIo-Dut AOyo
and Girls Had o Good Time
All the Same.
The season opened with regular old
fashioned donation where the people be-
stow generous gifts of garden sass"
and maple sugar, frosted cake and saus-
ages to the minister who has the worst
kind of indigestion from long surfeiting
on such delicacies, and where the sisters
take pieced quilts and pincushions to
the minister's wife who hasn't had new
dress since war time. The deacon bitches
up the team as soon as milkin' is over
and loads broadside Of pork and
bushel of potatoes and all the children
in the farm wagon, while his wife
chambers unassisted up on the high seat
and makes herself comfortable with the
baby and pumpkin pie in her lap, and
away they come humping and bouncing
through the crisp, frosty air, getting up
smart appetites for the supper
the good sisters will prepare, and
the sturdy, red checked country
lads pick up their sweethearts and
all their sweetheart's friends, to the
number of half score apiece, and
hasten to the merrymaking. How sur
prised the pale minister is when they all
walk in, though half dozen sisters have
talked to him mysteriously Of its being
their usual custom to give their pastor a
surprise after harvestin', and the master
of ceremonies, little gnarled old cob
Ser of the crab-apple species, had in
timated to the minister ''that he might
be wanted to hum that evenin'." How
the pink-cheeked lasses flutter into the
square chamber" to take of their
wrappings and to shake out their bright
dresses and tie their soft tresses with
snoods of blue and crimson, and the
weary farmers wives tramp laboriously
| up after them to take off their bonnets
and smooth down their hair against
their tired faces. They haven't had a
good time since they can remember, and
haven't stopped working for two con-
secutive days, except when the chill
dren came, since they were married.
Some of them have heavy babies on
their shoulders, and they all have
worked all day and will work all the
evening to get the supper ready. The
| 'men folks" come later (they seldom go
with their wives), and stay in the
kitchen talking about the weather and
| the crops.
"Oh, dear" says vivacious little vii
! lage woman in a garnet silk dress, with
a plush band down the side, ''there
those men are all together again. You'd
thiNl every last one of them had parted
| trSm his wife. Even at party, if you
don't watch em every minute, they all
get in one room and the women in the
other" The minister's wife looks as IL
She had been brought up on salt pork
and johnny cake, and had never had any
thing really new made for her or with
enough cloth in 1t since she was married.
| Her thin, scanty hair is combed up high
and twisted into tight little knot, and
her hard, rough hands are folded over
her skinny little overdress in awkward
and unaccustomed idleness, but the min.
| listers broadcloth is as sleek and his lin.
en- as snowy as hands can make it. She
Is nervous worried and restless: he is
complacent, dignihed and calm, because
he knows that she will arrange every
thing all properly; and so she does after
y little. In the tiny parlor where one
dismal Kerosene lamp shines dimly upon
the solemn scene and tintypes of depart
ed friends look severely down from their
| frames upon any attempt at converse.
uon, the mothers in Israel and the WON,
en- with the smallest babies sit in silent
row about the room and the ministers
| wlfn STAYS hare d,
IKE 10 go out in the other room where
the young married women have
managed to entice two men and arr
making merry at their expense. In the
doorway Sits the Chancellor of the Elk
chequer, with the 'ris'bands of his bin,
glngham shirt despoilipg the dignity O
she white bosom and collar donned fo
the occasion, labcriously writing with ,
blunt little pescil in WORKOUT mem
orandum book the contribution of III,
company. There was Deacon Smith
who brought "shugar, appels, vinnira
and pickles to the amount of 81" an,
Elder Brown, who donated lone chor,
Oh wood and some PUMPKINS, all to tn,
value Of s. (and the minister was sun
posed to go out and get the wood him
seltl; there were ten yards of dry
goods, $3.50" which the merchants wifi
brought and which her husband ha,
been trying to sell in vain for decade
there were socks tearfully and wonder
fuliy made, cabbages and potatoes, porl
and hams, sausage and beans, honey anG
ounce sauce" and in the center, ON
dlnner-piate of deli, actually was
little money, which the kindly -faced oil
chancellor counted anon as if it burno
his fingers. The boy who brought 81,
girls and took them all to supper pu
down quarter of dollar with as muc,
ceremony as if it had been Bank q
England note Tor e100. and the school