St. Johnsbury Caledonian. [volume] (St. Johnsbury, Vt.) 1867-1919, 1893-11-09


night, I'll be so ashamed of myself
that it'll wake me right up!"
Then the doctor bound up his eyes
and the poor boy said Thank
God !" two or three times, and they
could see the tears running down
his cheeks from under the cloth.
Lord! 1t was just as pitiful as a
broken-wnged bird
How about the girll Well; it
was all right for Abe-and all
wrong for Ephel But that's all
past and gone-past and gone.
Folks come for miles and miles to
see cross-eyed Abe with his eyes as
straight as a looms leg. Doctor
Brainard was a great man forever
after in those parts. Everywhere
else, too, by what | heard.
When the doctor and the squire
come to go, Abe spoke up, blindfold-
ed as he was, and says he:
doc, how much do you charge
Teller for savin' his life-making
man out of a poor wreck-doin'
what he never thought could be done
but by dyin' and goin to kingdom
come ?"
"Oh," says Doc Brainard, says he,
that amt what we look at as pay
practice. You didn't call me in; |
come of myself, as though it was
what we call a clinic. If all goes
well, and if you happen to have
barrel of apples to spare, you just
send them up to Squire Cations
house in Chicago, and I'll call over
and help eat EN-"
What did Abe say to that? Why,
sir, he never said word; but they
do say the tears started out again,
out from under the bandage and
down his cheeks. But then Abe he
had a hve-year-old pet mare he'd
raised from colt-pretty as
picture. kind as kitten, and fast as
split lightning; and next time Doc
come down Abe he just slipped out
to the barn and brought the mare
round and hitched her to the gate
post, and when Doc come to be 60
ing, says Abe:
Don't forget your nag, doctor;
she's hitched at the gate"
Well, sir, even then Abe had the
hardest kind of time to get Doc
Brainard to take that mare; and
when he did ride off, leadin' her, it
wasn't half an hour before back she
came, lickety-split, Doc said she
broke away from him and put for
home, but | always suspected he
didn't have no use for horse ne
couldn't sell nor hire out. and
couldn't afford to keep in the village
that was what Chicago was then.
But come along toward fall
Abe he took her right up to town,
and then the doctors practice had
grown so much that he was pretty
glad to have her; and Abe was
pretty glad to have him have her,
seeing all that had come to him
through havin' eyes like other folks
that's the schoolma am. mean.
How did the schoolma am take
it? well, it was this way. After
the cuttin Abe didn't show up for a
few days, till the inflammation got
down and he'd had some practice
handlin' his eyes, so to speak. He
just kept himself to himself, enjoy
ing himself. He'd 60 around doin'
the chores, singing so you could hear
him mile. He was always great
on singin' Abe was, though
ashamed to 60 to singing school
with the rest. Then, when the poor
boy began to feel like other folks,
he went right over to where school
ma am happened to be boardin
round, and walked right up to her and
took her both hands, and looked her
straight in the face and said;
"Do you know me p"
Well, she kind of smiled and blush
ed, and then the corners of her mouth
pulled down, and she pulled one
hand away, and-if you believe me-
that was the third time that girl
cried that season, to my certain
knowledge and all for nothin' either
time
What did she say? Why, she just
said she'd have to begin all over
again to get acquainted with Abe.
But Ephe's nose was out of joint,
and Ephe knowed it as we'll as any
body, Ephe did. 1t was Abe's eyes
to Ephe's nose.
Married Oh, yes, of course; and
lived on the farm as long as the old
folks lived, and afterwards, too;
Ephe staying right along like the
fool he always had been. That fell
Ter never did have as much sense as
a last years. birds nest.
Alive yet? Abe? Well, no.
Might have been if it hadn't been for
Shiloh. When the war broke out
Abe thought he'd ought to 60, old
as he was, so he went into the Sixth.
Maybe you've seen a book written
about the captain of Company K of
the Sixth. 1t was Company K he
went into-him and Ephe. And he
was killed at Shiloh-just as it al
ways seems to happen. He got
killed, and his worthless brother
come home. Folks thought Fph