Herald and news. [volume] (West Randolph, Vt.) 1878-1943, 1890-04-24


and sleep. l will put the defense OF
marble slab between you and that boys
outrages. Go, now, where the wicked
cease from troubling and the weary are
at rest?" At the departure of such
mothers let the music be an anthem IN
stead of a dirge. While you and l hear
no sound, yet there are at this moment
tens of thousands of parental hearts
breaking. All care was taken with
the boys schooling, all good counsels
given, and the equipment for sober
and earnest and useful life was provid-
ed, but it has all gone, and the foolish
son has become the heaviness OF his
mother.
Much of the poignancy Of the parental
grief rises from the ingratitude OF such
behavior. What an undertaking II IS
to conduct family through the all
ments and exposures of early life! Talk
about the skill demanded Of a sea cap
tain commanding a ship across the
ocean! That requires less skill than to
navigate a young soul in safety across
the infantile and boyhood years. The
sicknesses that assault, the temptations
that entrap, the anxieties that are ex-
cited! Young man, you will never know
what your mother has suffered for you.
You will never know how your father
has toiled for you. You have bean in all
their thoughts, in all their plans, in all
their prayers, from the time your hrst
breath was drawn to this moments re-
SEPARATION. What they could do for your
health, what they could do for your hap
piness, what they could do for your
mind, what they could do for your soul,
have been absorbing questions. To
earn a livelihood for you has not always
been an easy thing for your father. By
what fatigues of body and what disturb
ances Of mind, and long years OF strug-
gle. in which sometimes the losses we're
greater than the gains, he got bread for
you, paying for it in the sweat OF his
own brow and the red drops OF his own
hearts blood He looks older than he
ought to look at his years, for it has
been work, work, work.
Many a time he felt like giving up
the battle, but then he looked at your
helplessness and the helplessness of the
household, and then he nerved himself
up anew and said: "By the help Of God
/ will not stop; my children must have
home and education and advantages,
and comfortable starting in the world,
and l must get something ahead, so that
IL am taken away these helpless ones
will not be turned out on the cold chart
ties of the world" Yes, your father
has been a good friend to you. he has
never told any one, and he never will
tell any one, OF the sacrifices he has
made for you. And he is ready to keep
right on until unto that hand that has
been toiling for you all those years
shall come the very numbness OF death.
You can not afford to break his heart.
But you are doing it. Yes, you are. You
have driven the dagger clear up to the
hilt.
And your mother-I warrant she has
never told you much about the nights
when you were down with the scarlet
fever, or diphtheria, and she slept not
wink, or, falling into drowsiness, your
first cry awakened her, and brought the
words: what is it, my dear?" Oh, il
the old rocking chair could speak, Oh,
if the cradle could only tell its story OF
years! And when you got better. and
were fretful and hard to please, as is
usual in convalescence, she KEEP her pa
thence so we'll, and was as kind as you
we're unreasonable and cross Oh, mid
nights of motherly watching, how can
you keep silence? Speak out and tell
that wandering young man the story
that he so much needs to hear.
BY the by, wonder what has become
Of our old cradle in which all OF us chill
dren we're rocked l must ask my sister
when see her next time. we were
large family, and that old cradle was
going good many years. l remember
| Just how it looked. 1t was old-fashioned
and had no tapestry. Its two sides and
canopy all of plain wood, but there was
a great deal of sound sleeping in that
old cradle, and many aches and pains
were soothed by it as it moved to and
fro by day and night. Most wildly
remember that the rockers. which came
out from under the cradle, were on the tor
and sides very smooth, so smooth thai
they actually glistened. They must have
been worn smooth by foot that Ions
ago ceased its journey. How tired the
foot that pressed it must sometimes
have gotl But it did not stop for that. L
went right on, and rocked for Phebe the
first and for Dewitt the last. And i
was a cradle like that, or perhaps o
modern make and richly uphol
stored, in which your mothei
rocked you. Can it be that fo
all that care and devotion you are pay
ing her back with harsh words, or neg
lect. or wicked life? Then l mus
tell you that you are the foolish sol
who Is the heaviness of his mother.
Better go home and kiss her and ask he
forgiveness. Kiss her on the lips tina
have SO often prayed for you. Kiss he
on the forehead that has often ached TO
you. Kiss her on the eyes thathave S,
often wept over you. Better go RICH
away, for she will be dead before long
And how Will you feel then, after yo'
realize that it is your waywardnes
that killed her? Romulus, made no lay