Juniata sentinel and Republican. [volume] (Mifflintown, Juniata County, Pa.) 1873-1955, 1889-09-18
Doing Mems Jobs.

1t is always interesting to see how a
woman does a mans work.
There is a slat of the garden fence,
and the woman who owns the fence
thinks that she will fix it. She gets A
ha inner, and a saw, and some nails.
and some old gloves, aid fdStens up the
house for fear Il tramp may come along
VIII le she is out. Then she looks up
the street and down the street, 20 see il
anybody IS in sight, and then she climbs
bravely over the wall, and catches her
skirt III a sharp rock, and pulls down
half a hundred stones after her. and
springs to avoid them. She steps on a
stick, and thinks it is a snake, and
screams, and scares the hens half TO
death, and some of them run under the
wood shed, and some of them fly up on
the roof OF the barn, and some of them
scoot over the fence into johnson :
yard JOhnson's dog pulls out their
tail. feathers, aud feud springs up be-
tween the two families winch will ex-
tend TO the third and fourth genera
tIoRs of the tribe.
The woman gets the pailing in posi-
tiOn, and holds it at the bottom with
her knee while she nails il at the top.
Any fool can drive NALL Why, of
course. She lifts the hammer and
strikes with a will. the naIl turns dex-
terOuSly to one side, to avoid the blow,
and the wOman'S thumb-nail turns
black, because 1t was in the way when
the hammer fell, aud because she didn' t
happen TO take 1t out of the way.
She has TO 90 back to the house to
get some aTnIca and some camphOr,
and 10y the time tIey have been applied,
"A d that thumb has StOppei aching,
the tin peddler calls, and wants To give
her five cents for the rags she has been
industE!0usly saving Cor a year, and
which she has felt all along 1t was such
an economical thing 10 do.
BY tine time the peddler has gone, the
IN mister calls To talk To her about mis-
sion work in China, and by the time
he has departed there Is boy TO sell
blueOerries, and a woman with the
History of the JohnStoWn Horror, ("
and by that time il Is noon.
After dinner the woman starts out
once more TO fix that pailing. She
takes some more nall, and f-els de-
termined to conquer. Sle pounds and
pounds, and the nails all 90 in skew ing
and break off, and at last the hammer
fiIeS off from tine handle, and 1t takes
half an hour 10 put 1t on again, and all
wedge 1t In place.
Then she applies herself to business
once more, and attacks the pa.ling
with renewed vigor. She nails 1t this
time, and stands back to survey her
work. Somehow it doesn't look Just
rigut, and she discovers that she has
put IL ON wrong end up She Will take
II off. That Is easier SAID than done.
When a woman does a thing she does
it TO stay done, and before she can get
all these broken, and crooked, and
skewed nails out, tue pdiiing Is spl
into kindling-woOd, and the rails to
which it Is nailed look as if they had
been sub iected to a fusillade from a
gaJtling-gun-
And a. the last nail gives way before
her frantic endeavOrs, she lets 90, or
rather the pailing lets go, so suddenly,
that she loses her ba' 'ance and falls
backward into the ditch which some
enterprising devotee of thorough DRAIN
age has eXcavated, and she wrenches
her back, and tears her dress, and vets
both of her feet, and brushes her hat,
and scrambleS out, just as Mrs. Jones,
with whom she i at swords point,
rides by with company from the city,
aud laughs at her predicament.
Then that woman Is mad, and she
sticks a piece OF wood in that fence,
and VOWS 1t may stay there, for what
she cares, TIL the crack of doom. Then
she gathers up her tools and goes home.
Next time when there is a fence to be
mended, she VIII g We the carpenter
half dollar for an hours work, and
feel that she is saving money.