Indian chieftain. [volume] (Vinita, Indian Territory [Okla.]) 1882-1902, 1889-08-22

low earth until breakfast time and
went in absolutely hungry.
Day after day she kept up this
course She gave me hardly a min.
ute alone and she had me read aloud
TO her when I wanted book.
~ haven't time and you mustn't
read much, the doctor says; so wen
have TO carry Il out together and
she produced "Huckleberry Finn"
which she alternated with "Rudder
Grange" so that between tho remark.
able humorous adventures In the
former and Pomona's performance In
the latter | had no time TO think Of
love or sentiment except in the most
ludicrous light Then the flower-beds
needed so much hoeing and scratching
and wedding. and the old pansy bed
opened up In such marvellous beauty
that began 10 be quite worried for
fear the new one would not rival II,
so renewed hoeing and wedding had
TO be kept up. had TO keep on my
thick shoes, for Il was supposed thet
the dog had carried on one OF my
slippers, and my hammock came TO
grief and uselessness by the calls
chewing A big hole in It; so that
really was Obliged to do nothing but
work out in the garden day after day
and how my flowers grewl
My pansies outrivaled the old ones.
and forgot every thing, even my af-
inity, in the delight OF watching for
the new faces which peered up at me
from the velvety blossoms, and was
too tired when night came TO moon
over myself, much less any Arabclla
or Ethelinda, so sound sleep visited mo
quickly.
About the time | reached this state
and could outrival Aunt Becky in
dressing and reaching the flower
garden in the morning, she found time
to fix up her own bedstead and leave
me to my privacy again.
1t was late in the fall when she said
70 me one day;
"Well, Rue, do you think you Hast
through the winter?"
Last Why, Aunt Becky, wouldn't
do any thing else for the worldl' was
my convincing answer. for It actually
struck pang to my heart to think Of
dying.
well, guess your folks want to
see you home by this time;" and home
went Aunt Becky with me.
They were all ready to receive me-
with pillows in the carriage and
tender. sorrowing faces; she had done
all the corresponding, as did not
like 10 write letters, and had done It
as she pleased. So. when rushed in
upon the family with my red cheeks
and face as brown as a gypsy's, they
could not have been more astonishcd II
l had risen from the dead.
II said you could cure her II any
body couldr' father exclaimed, in de-
light that night
"But what did you give her, Becky?"
my mother anxiously asked.
"Toolsr was her sententious an
swer.
"Whatr'
''Tools-rake and hoe and spade and
trowell-gingham dress and thick.
soled shoes;-took away the cloves
and pencils she was eating till she
looked like tallow candle;-hid her
love-sick stories and death-wishing-
for poetry and gave her something to
laugh at instead-let the calves eat up
her lazy hammock and broke down
my old bedstead so't she couldn't be
alone minute TO cry and take on over
her sentimental fol-de-rol;-turned
her right out into the open air and
let the sky and the breeze and the Aow-
ers help me out in it. "
WAS that all, Becky2" Mother was
so surprised that she could not find
any thing else 10 say.
Wasn't that enough, as long as 1t
cured her?'
"And do you mean to say that she
was not going into n decline at all?'
mother urged.
"Yes. and no. She hadn't any dis
ease that's down in the books, though
/ don't know what eating that stuff
would have done in time. But she
was declining fast into a foolish. senti-
mental. romantic simp!eton, with all
her ideas Of love and heroines and
aflnities and death, and she might
have declined by this time into some
thing worse, for she was fast getting
where she could have been most easily
led into something she would have had
cause to regret perhaps all her days.
Queer. that mothers can't see such
thingsl"
why. Becky. how you talkl / had
never thought Of thatr' Mother was
Mortified as well as alarmed.
"Yes, that's just It. You we're too
busy with your household affairs and,
like most women, thought If any thing
allied your girl II must be something
for the family doctor to prescribe for;
so she was drifting right on down TO
ruin. like enough, unless her own hard
sense got the better Of her in time
all just because you didn't try 10 un-
derstand her. But Rue's cured, Tn
pretty sure; now see you don't let Bess
get on the same decline, that's all D"
And Bess did not Mother was
awakened In time as we'll as ]. / did
not lapse into another decline; and
mother saw TO It that the other girls
were safely guarded by her enlight-
ened eye through the dangerous ro-
mantle period for which she found
Aunt Becky's 10 be an infallible cure
Sarah b Scarborough, in Ladies
Home Journal