The Laurens advertiser. (Laurens, S.C.) 1885-1973, 1893-10-17
AUNT SUSAN'S QUILT.

pltd60 l0uny bdlu llUUlG IlEDs Ddhts WIFI
arms akimbo and head twisted to one
side, as she stepped back and gazed
with admiration at the object spread
out on the bed. It was a carefully
pieced quilt, OF a somewhat intricate
pattern.
"Jimmy's bride can't help being
tickled with that" said Mrs. Dake, as
she smoothed out q fold and IL she
knows anything about nice quilting,
she'll sec that want quilted in q day.
Well, 1 guess not l quilted ev'ry last
stitch of it myself, and there's q good
half-day's work in some o. them blocks
with the feather and herrin'-b bone pat
terms and the shell border all round
the aidge. L had that quilt in the
frames five weeks and three days, and
/ put all the time 1 could get on it, and
there amt no slack work, tired as |
did get of seeing it round"
She smoothed out another crease.
"Lemme see" she went on. "There's
seven pieces in the quilt, and q good
many of 'em are pieces of Jimmy's lit
tie baby dresses. That1l please his
wife, 1 Jest know. Here's a block made
of calico like q little pink dress he had
when his ma first put him into short
dresses. l rememberit was made with
q low neck and short sleeves, like they
made baby dresses in those days, and
his little shoulders and arms was al
most as pink as the dress.
"And here's pieces like a little
double gown he had fore he went into
short dresses. And this piece of blue
c%hambery is like little sun-bonnet he
had, all lined with fine white jaconet.
And here is u piece of fine muslin with
q little pink sprig in it like the first
short dress Jimmy ever had. He did
look so cunnln' in it, with the sleeves
Topped back, and a tumble-curl on the
top Of his head
"Ill show his wife-to-be all these
pieces, and If she amt tickled with the
quilt, she'll be a queer one"
Then Mrs. Dake vent over to an old
fashioned mahogany bureau with brass
knobs, and took from the upper drawer
a large, square, cream-tinted envelope,
out Of which she carefully drew the
%"invite" to Jimmy's wedding.
"Mr. and Mrs. William p. Holbrook
invite you to be present Vt the mar
riage of their daughter Helen and
James Barclay Larkin, Wednesday
evening, September fourteenth"
Then followed the address of the
brides parents, in a city four hundred
miles from Mrs. Dake's home.
"But I'm goin' !" she said, gleefully,
as she slipped the invitation back into
it's envelope. I'D go if it was twice
as far. l amt seen Jimmy for near on
to five years. and he always seemed
like my own boy to me cause l never
had none o. my own, and I helped to
bring him up after his w ma died,
when he want but just in his first lit.
tie trousies.
81 amt been so far from home in
many u long year, and l reckoned my
troualin, layS waS 6pna hast Ts--~ rot n
GO and see Jimmy married. must see
Elviry Hodge right away about turn
ing and making over my black silk,
and / must see Samantha Rose about q
new cap. l guess I'll have to have
something kind O. smart for a city wed.
din, where they'll all be finified up so
/ don't want Jimmy to be ashamed oil
his old aunty but lawsy me Jimmy
wouldn't be 'shamed of me if I went in
raised to set clothes above his rela'
tions, and he amt got nothing to be
shamed of in any of his folks"
Then Jimmy's aunt. her face aglow
with loving thoughts of seeing Jimmy
again, folded up the quilt carefully in
an old sheet, and laid it away in a low.
er drawer of the bureau, saying
81 s'pose they'll nave lots of nice
presents, but 1Il warrant you they
won't have one that represents as much
lovin' .abor as that quilt. I had to cry
with the pieces of his baby dresses in
'em. His wife ought to think the
world and all of the quilt. 1 hope she
won't go to using it common"
Mrs. Dake, who was q widow and
childless, lived in the small, remote
country town in which her nephew,
James Larkin, had been born, and from
which he had gone to become a sue
cessful young lawyer in the city. He
had not been back to the home of his
childhood for five years: AS his Aunt
write letters" but he often sent brief
notes and little gifts to his aunt to as
sure her of his affection and graft
tude.
He had not announced his engage
ment to her, n the invitation to his
wedding was one of the greatest sur
prises of Mrs. Dake's u%neventful life.
"He jest wanted to give his old
aunty a big s'prise," she said to Elvira
Hodge, the village seamstress, when
she came to fix over" Aunt SUI
my W eyes at first. 1t don't seem no
longer than yesterday that Jimmy was
runnin' round here in pinafores and
to think of him bein' married-I can't
git over it!
"But I'll give him q s'prise, too. l
don't intend to give him u hint that
I'm comm TO his weddin', and if he
won't be took back when he sees me
marchin' in on him, my name amt
Susan Elizabeth Dake! Don't you
reckon his wife'n be tickled with that
quilt, Elviry ?"
"They'd ought to be, that's sure"
said Elvira.
81 think it's a kind of q special pro-
violence that / put it in the frames
when 1 did. / didn't callate on quilt
i'm it until next winter, but I had q
kind of q feelin' that / had better do it
when / did, and now it's turned out
that there vas good reason why l
should quilt it then"
There was quite a company of Aunt
Susan's friends at the little station to
see her off on the morning she started.
There was unusual color in her cheeks,
and unwonted sparkle in her eyes.
She babe each Of her friends goodbye
two or three times, and promised to
take good care of herself. Some of
them she promised a crumb or two of
Jimmy's wedding-cake, and II full ac-
count of the wedding festivities.
San IL you could git me a scrap OF
the brides weddin' dress, nm of any
of her other dresses, fer my silk quilt,
Susan, I'd be SO pleased with 'em!" said
old Mrs; Gray.
II will II I can, Nancy" said Aunt