The progressive farmer. [volume] (Winston, N.C.) 1886-1904, 1892-07-05

He'll be well presently. Don't cry,
Mistis; don't cry"
Here my grandmother always broke
down. Half century never erased that
memory, and somewhere, somehow, in
the realms of the great uncertain, yet
certOl11, think exists still. Charlotte,
Simpson, wife, lived in sight of the
smoke of the Stedman homestead, and
her child, Ellen, grew up side by side
with Sally Carson both eating out of
the same plate and sharing the same
fare-when together. When they set
tied In their own homes in the married
estate, they settled in the same neigh
borhOod, and in the same neighborhoo
they are living to day the best of friends,
mothers of grown-Up children and
grandchildren. Ellen is Aunt Ellen"
to us children She sometimes comes
to see me, and 1 am always glad to see
her. | seem to live over again the
halcyOn days spent at my dear grand
mothers knees listening to her full
joys of motherhood (when her children
were smalD and her bitter woes of
widowhood. The sweet simplicity of
the former, to my little mind, com
pensated for the impositiOns and injus-
tlces practiced upon the latter Per
haps l understood them better. AS a
tribute to the memory of my grand
father, l will add that my grandmother
claimed he was "never himself again"
after the sale of Simpson. A tender
parent and a mort affectiOnate hus-
band, it is possible that the broken ties
of this faithful bondman decOyed from
home without the "sweet old word
good bye" had tendency to tamper
with his nervous system. He called
Sampson in delirium a short while be-
fore he died, and Sampson was a house
hold shadow as long as the household
remained, and in my strange imagina
tiOn, in that family circle of five graves
sequestered IN an half-forgotten spot,
where noted dogwOod tree casts it's
white flowers in spring, and it's red
leaves IN autumn, Sampson is the dis
course.
This narrative, in it's historical rela-
tions, would be incomplete did l not
mention thai a company under the
leadership of VIM. W. Stedman was
mustered and marched to the South
ampton insurreCtiOn in 1881. He was
one Of the braves who helped to hang
Nat. Turner up the green apple tree"
and l expect put the first shot in the
misere BILE image.
Bubbling upon the ears of solitude, a
mysterious fountain, known abroad as
" The White Oak Spring where Z
play ed when a child, and washed my
dirty hands and bare feet, and looked
at my little sun burnt f tee as in a mir
ror Mr.. Stedman's game stock fought
in political campaigns, and decided by
blood and feathers the majority of the
Democrats over the Wings. Demo
cratic to the backbonel and all his des-
cendants that know of. This old and
familiar haunt, the White Oak Spring,
has seen It's best days, and with the ex-
ceptiOn of an occasional wanderer, is
visited only by cattle seeking to slack
their thirst and catch a nod
By some strange providence at the
death of my grandfather, the boys
we're taken into the house of his father,
who survived him, in Cumberland Co.,
n. c., stopping in the streets of Raleigh
to feed and rest their team. Here they
received first class educations and were
"made men Of" while the widowed
mother and helpless girls were left at
what had been home, to fight the battle
of life alone. But as 1.-The mill of the
gods grind slow" they also grind sure.
Thus Sally Carson's childhood was
uneventful, except in it's hardships
peculiar to certain children upon whom
the drudgery of the family falls. She
spaded up the garden, gathered the
apples and mastered all theunmastered
tasks fitted to her shoulders, winning
the title of "man and boy" The most
remarkable event being the early i'm
preston she made upon my father and
the number of years he waited for her
to Out-grOw short dresses. She en-
joyed the reputation OF being the pret-
TEST girl in the neighbOrhoOd and the
" Judges sweetheart" " and has enjoyed
q home of her own, and a modest sur
plus, ever since the old Christmas Eve
she became his bride, and sit by huge
log fire in an old house love to think
about, in whose deserted walls heard
the first echo of my voice, yelling for
the COWS "tO come home"
At 60 Sally Carson is active and
happy and the last of her family except
one-J. Q. Stedman, Fayetteville, n.
@. Like other women, she enjoys a
compliment, which is sometimes at the
expense of the writer. think she also
possesses the Stedman-pOetic vein,
though the never made any display of
it except in the site of her well, which
is under tree that she and her first
child's nurse planted 43 years ago. In
this gigantic shade, that her absent
children sometimes dream about,
swings to and fro the old oeken
bucket" the iron-bound bucket, and
the moss grown bucket. She points it
out to strangers and tells the story
have told. She has told it for a quarter
of a century, but it has never grown
twice. She has an accurate memory.
She has been the mother of eight chill
dren, five of whom are living, and nine
grandchildren. She was left widow
May 31St, 1869, and with the old energy
of the young Sally Carson, she strove