The united opinion. [volume] (Bradford, Vt.) 1881-1970, 1892-07-15
S Great Historic al Event

his English, and the eloquence and polisl
of his sentences, probably unknown to him
self, often took the rythm of verse. Once
in preaching the funeral sermon of an ageC
minister, a sanity, God-fearing man, ht
said, my friends, our departed brother ere
he died requested me to preach his funera
sermon ard he selected the text, now my
hearers what do you think it was. You
would never guess it. Should YOU turn the
leaves of the bible from lid to lid you would
never find it-''God be merciful to me a
! sinner" Another, also a native Scotch
man, Mr.. Milligen, by creed Scotch Pres
| denunciation of sin ought to have awaken
ed every sinner in sound of his voice.
Our schools at that time We're cheap
| schools, taught by cheap masters such as
the district could afford, often wholly unfit
to teach such pupils even as we were.
When we had one of them we, took their
mental calibre quickly and did most I'M
mercifully snub him. Not that much could
have been expected for eight dollars a
month, for like the railroad conductor down
in Maine who was found fault with for not
having good voice to call out the stations,
replied that they could not expect bari
tone for thirty dollars a month. Let me
to read. A long class of us were trying to
toe the mark and read at the same time, be-
hind red hot Franklin stove and The odOr
of singed wool was very apparent. A boy
was slowly spelling out a sentence from
the old English Reader, the last line of
which was, at last falls into the gulf of OBJ
livion. He spelled Oblivion, could not
pronounce it. A bright little girl who was
tired and nearly burning, and wanted to
read her sentence badly and have done with
it, nudged him and whispered call it Mex
leo and so he did, and read it-at last falls
sy.fA tI,a nf l,14I,A IT,
teacher could not himself pronounce it and
thought it the easiest way to get out it |
cannot say, at any rate he let it go Mexico.
Then our parents made another effort and
hired Jonathan Tenney for three consecu-
tive winters We appreciated him and the
Improvement we made was wonderful.
Some of YOU may remember him, he died
few years ago in New York State, foremost
among the educators of that state.
The books we had were very few. A
much worn edition of Bunyon'S Pilgrims
Progress which neighbor loaned us. We
read and re-read and then reverently car
ried it home only to borrow it again in a
English edition of Josephus which they did
not like to lend, but kindly allowed people
to go and read. My mother sometimes
went for an hour or two perhaps, and bribed
us to stay quietly at home with the promise
that she would tell us the story of what she
Ituus w q ildu DOobu pOCLl VI UllC Lduy VI
the Lake and learned it by heart, could re-
peat nearly all of it. But what we fell
back on was the bible, not that we were
very plous children, but we sought out the
stories and the wonderful characters. We
much admired Deborah who dwelt under a
palm tree and rode up in chariot with
Barah to deliver Israel, and whose song
when she returned from Victory, we com
mitted to memory and used to recite it.
The women of the present day who are
lecturing on w0man's rights and wrongs
might learn a lesson of assurance from the
Song of Deborah. We had an old bible
with pictures, one of the Garden OF Eden
with lovely picture of Eve being beguiled
by Satan in the hideous form of a serpent.
We were most pitiful of Eve, we bore it as
long as we could and then tore Satan out
and burned him up. We have learned
since that he is not so easily disposed of.
| have inherited from some ancestor a
minute memory of dates and events and
conditions and ramificatiOns of conditions.
rhis kind of memory is set down IN Up
hams Mental Philosophy as the longest
kind of memory, often found in persons of
weak intellect. Itmay be true, undOubted |
~ is in my own case, but | can't help It
and 1t has sometimes served me well and |
has filled in with pleasant Renaissance |
many an otherwise lonely hour. I love to
think OF the comrades of my youth and fol-
low their fortunes and that of their children |
Many have gone out from here into broad |
er ATTITUDES and made for themselves a rep |
utatl0n and name, many of them most re-
spectacle men and women. | could men
zion many such, the johnson boys of Butfa-
TO- the Does, the Rev. Jonas o. Peck whose
mother, Jane Tucker, we all remember as
girl OF much learning, mother worthy
)f such son. One long since dead.
Robert MclndOe, boy of marvellous in
senulty, who, though boy as he was in
years, builded an organ for the old-tashlon-
'd gallery, which was our especial pride
md JOY, and it discourses sweet music as
IN accompaniment under the leadership of
Noses Brock, to Old Hundred and Dundee.
'our families here had common ancestry
With Chester A. Arthur, Jonas Tucker,
ames Johnston, Samuel Rogers and our
Wn. The maternal grandmOthers or great
as the generation might be
eing sisters.
How well [ remember the people that
aggregated in this then new house of wor-
hip. Your father and mine. your mother
nd mine, brothers and sisters long since
cad, and some of us are left to tell the
tory That stalwart band of brothers, the
rocks, men of strong purposes, the Jewels
18th their biblical name of David and Solo
ION, john Carleton man of gentle ways,
etter educated than some of his nelghb0rs.
dudley Carleton, who with his two hands
ewed much of the timber for this house.
lis large family still unbroken by death.
aniel Kimball, ESQ.,, Isah Rogers, a man
deep religious experience. Doc Carter,
is eyes half closed in day dreaming, dreams
hich perhaps he did not realize. And the
uckers, a most worthy family of such
myth of body that a wag asked one of
lem which world he paid his poll tax in,
ld we used to say that by actual measure
nd count ninety feet of Tucker came to
Getting every Sunday.
Old Col. Smith who most generously gave
e ground for the site of the meeting house
I'd the cemetery, and whose descendants
e now prominent business men in the
wn and who remember the church from
me to time with substantial gifts, and
any who have abided here as tillers of
e SOIL none the less men, for pyramids
e pyramids in wales. o. l.. Rogers, a fl
an of great activity of body and mind and a.
ertness of execution, still has his feet fC
anted on his native hill and bides his 81
ne. Ill
| need not tell you of the exceeding beauty b
these hills and valleys He who runs il
ay read. This amphitheatre of majestic hi
lis, the winding Connecticut at our feet. Il
atch the fog of an early summers morn m
9. following the course of-the river and al
ling up i'm fluctuations like a massive d,
Owy curtain with its background of pur- al
e SUBMITS, and you behold picture not
on forgotten. Like the SwitZer TO his Il
tive Alps, / come back here and love 1t ii
IRE and III