The record-union., 1894-06-02
THE POSTNISTRESSES OF SOHONK.

Copyright, 1894. by Edgar L. Wakeman. All
rights reserved.
In the dreamful Catskills, where bold
spur of those legend-haunted mountains
iuts out to the eastward and overnangs
the broad and placid waters of the Hud-
son. is a sweet old eerie to which sum-
mer guests come from the American
metropolis for months of lettering and
rest.
The old colonial post routes of the re-
gion are still quite generally maintained,
and the primitive folk of these sparsely
settled mountain neighborhoods, as well
as the aristocratic idlers from the great
city by the sea, receive their drlplets Oh
mail, in many instances, at the same GU
rious old cross-road postot1ices which
were in use when the postboy's letter
pouches bore the seal of our then King
George the Fourth.
This was the case at Sohonk. The Post
master, old Peter Van Brunt, now 81
years of age, had held the office since
long before the memory of man. a great
nation had grown to maturity since his
commission had been delivered to him.
Political parties had changed. States Of
the Union had been made, foreign and
domestic wars had been fought and
score of new administrations had come
and pone. but old Peter Van Brunt still
remained Postmaster at Sohonk.
None OF the mountain folk cared, so
their few letters and newspapers came
with regularity, and Peter himself cared
less as age crept upon him, while all that
was required of him was his name
affixed properly and timely TO official
reports and his good old wife could
attend the tiny window and gossip With
the country folk who occasionally strag-
gled IN.
But when Peters faithful spouse passed
away there came near being new order
of things at Sohonk. so there would
have been had not two little tots of girls,
of and 10 years OF age, remained with
him as the only links OF activity and
usefulness between old Peters falling
energies and his remarkable lease OF OIL
cial life.
These gifts had come incidentally, as
old Peter, who was something of phil
ospher stoutly asserted that all good
things came TO man.
A strange dreamy-eyed witeless phySi-
clan had come summerlng into the ats
kills long before the resort palaces be-
gan to appear in the gIens and beside the
shadowy lakes of the Sohonk region.
He had made his home at Peters abode,
which, in colonial times, had been a
Catskill inn behind the smart sign Of
the Red Lion that still swung creakingly
above the wide, low door of the little
postoffice.
One day when father and children were
clambering among the rocks, the father
had lost his foothold and fallen 20 his
death in a cruel gorge, hundreds OF feet
frharo had hpan a hfIriQl with
two white-faced children to mourn in the
mute wondering way OF childhood,
after which Peter had bluntly asked Of
his wife:
katherine, what's to be done with tn
little 'uns, now?'
Muffin but keep 'em, Peter" was the
quiet, motherly reply.
This had been done, and their curly
little heads had so long bobbed up and
down behind the ancient row Of boxes in
the low-ceilinged postoffice, that the
mountain folk, waiting for their mail.
had looked on as the tots helped Aunt
Katherine at the window with good-na-
tured smiles, and had finally come TO call
the bright-faced waits, ''the Postmis-
tresses of Sohonk."
This appeIlation, and those of sister
to the elder, and isis; TO the younger
girl, had finally overshadoWed their own
names which at last faded out with the
incident of their coming, and the coun-
trYside's insiStence Of its sobriquets did
the rest, SO that when old Peters wife
had entered the dreamless sleep, and old
Peter himself took more persistently TO
his pipe and the porch, or the shady side
of his pretty garden trellises, their i'll
vestment with the names of Sister and
Sis Van Brunt, and their duties and
titles OF the PostAistresses OF Sohonk,
were apparently permanent and COM
plete.
1t seemed that nothing was ever to oc-
cur TO change the simple round of endless
quiet in the lives OF these quaint little
Postmistresses OF Sohonk.
Old Peter Gozed and dreamed of the
days OF the Vans and Nons, with never a
shade OF toreboding fitting across his
ample, peaceful face. Sister and Sis cared
Tor the garden, attended, by turns, the
droning countryside school, over against
the tiny church set round with Whisper
ing willows and plaintive cedars, did the
little housework there was left to do in
the curious old habitation, like demure
and ancient housewives, and each day,
as Matthew Stuyvesant, the mountain
mail carrier, passed or repaSSed behind
his grizzled mule, were ready, punctu-
ally as time itself. to receive or deliver
the little pouches which came and went.
Cur Gus bout them air gals,u old Mat
thew Stuyvesant would mutter. Gould
set my WaCcn by '6nl. Nh6n buy boss,
er q mule, ed'gree's nuth'n. Them gaps
got ped gree in 'em m tain't no Sohonk
strain, neither. They'll break loose some
time, fur ped gree allus tellsr'
1t is unlikely that mail-carrier Mat
thew's words would have proven truly
prophetic if Sohonk had remained So
honk. But 1t could not. A mile or two
distant was a great gorge in the noun
tains where tiny lake lay like a bed oi
silver between cliffs OF emerald and
bronze. A chapel-like structure arose
beside it as ii magic, and soon rich city
idlers sought Lake Sohonk for Its won
drous scenery and bracing mountain air.
Then the curly heads bobbed up and
down more rapidly and longer each day
behind the ancient row of boxes, for all
of the mail for the guests of the great
hotel now passed through the little So
honk office, and once in while strag-
Cling parties from the lake, in the vaga-
rous, quizzical mood which settles upcn
summer loiterers everywhere, came over
TO the oIden village TO see the curious
colonial inn, to bother old Peter about
the time when the century was young,
and TO inquisitively peep at the little
Postmistresses of Sohonk
Ned Watson. young man of 20 and a
guest at the hotel beside the lake, had
come upon the quaint old nest during his
wanderings in the romantic region. with
something of the feelings of original dis
covery. In some inexplicable way be
felt himself powerfully drawn to the two