Waterbury evening Democrat. [volume] (Waterbury, Conn.) 1887-1895, 1892-01-20
PLEASANT NEIoHBoRs,

Persons Who Borrow Everything from a
Wooden Leg to a Toothpick.
Borrow" said she. "What won't
folks borrow!''
'She" was a thin woman in print
dress with q red crocheted shoulder
cape, and was raking leaves in a yard.
She engaged the writer in conversation
because she saw sympathetic look in
his eye. He pitied her because she was
blistering her hands and tanning her
complexion in the November winds.
He was!also sympathetic because he was
on the right side of the fence for sym.
pathy.
She was a sharp-spoken wsoman-au.
other cause for sympathy. She was
evidently born that way, bat she was
plainly unfortunate in her birth. If
she had had a choice in the matter at
the time of the selection of her larynx
we fancy, from other things about her,
that her voice would now have been
pitched at A instead Of q.
The conversation did 1aot start on
borrowing. 1t began. on leaves. She
said she guessed the wind bowed them
in. We suggested th,at she had proba-
bly, borrowed them from her ueighbor
for the fun of raking. That is as near
| co " . CbA 1C4uO04UOE AOW 1t began. we
do remember how it ended.
Borryin'!'' said she. s'My grand.
father had wooden leg and so did one
of his neighbors. My grandfather's
leg was painted and fixed up, and his
parties and SIGH. Onceh borr-ied it to
wear to muster. He got run over by
carryan and killed. His wilder claims
| hot ho 1oa1rIo.ol &o
they buried him in it.
1--WE got a neighbor who comes over
to borry everything. She borrowed a
parasol of me in May and return it last
week. She was mich obliged, she said.
I never said one word, was SO para
| lyzed o speech to sec her bring it
home"
| do folks borrow as much as they
used TOP"
"Jes' the same, jes' the same. Over
in my town where 1 was born I've got
a sister. She's pestered to death with
| good-fornothin' neighbors who borry
sugar, and tea, and butter, and eggs.
and all such things. I was over there
| this summer, and in came little girl
after some sugar. Sister says to her:
| I amt got none Then the little girl
says: Will you lend us some salt pork?'
Says sister: IVES out O. salt pork
| We'll, mum says. goes on that little
girl, that eff YOU ain got no sugar nor
no salt pork, might. borry your black
| lace shawl and ball % butter.''
| The woman went on r-al1ing leaves.
''Borryin' does grow on folks, too"
she added, after awhile. ''There's the
woman that lives over i'll that house,
the house with the y;Gllcr curtains on
| the kitchen windci's- She's n good
woman, but she got to borryin' for a
society she and me blonged to. She
used to come in and say: Now Sister
W, you're got to L. al me your oil stove
TO take down to tlH, hall I'd do it,
Then she borl-ied it for herself. Now
she berries it for the ncighbors. Pretty
soon when | want it I'll have to go out
and borry it of her or one of the neigh
bors She'd go round last summer say
in: For the lam sales, what you
| a-ballin' an a-slaHiIl' over that hot stove
for? Why don't you borry Miss WIS
oil-stovc?' Many's the time 1 lent her
stove and oil to run it. Then she'd
claim pics for the society, and then
she'd borry EN- for herself-she says
my pies suit her. Heaven only knows
what she'll borry next! She berries my
boy for errands, my girl'to take care O.
the babies don't object, but it's ag-
gravatin' to have some one out in the
porch all the time dependin' on you for
the ordinary necessities of life."-
Lewiston (Me.) Journal,