Pawtucket tribune. (Pawtucket, R.I.) 1890-189?, 1894-04-24
THE FAMILY TREE.

Elizabeth, embraced me In our front hall,
and before could get out Of my ulster
asked me II ~ would get her tree"
Now, to be empty and cold and tired and
10 be asked on the threshold Of ones door
and dinner In midwinter for "a tree, " even
by the being whom one adores Is trifie
irritating. am xmiable as rule and q
ruler, but the tone In which said, "a
whatr' was not up TO the marital mark.
But my own Elizabeth knew me too well
10 be deferred.
"Why, dear, Mrs. Makehay Higginson
was here this afternoon, and she said 1
ought to be a Colonial Dame, and / can't
be one, she says, unless have tree
which the Colonial Danes are TO sit upon
at their meeting, and II it's all right
they will take me In"
"Humphi don't doubt they will.
"She says that everybody that Is any
body is doing all they can to get up tree,
and, dear, she said that you were so awful
ly clever that you could get me up tree
In no time"
MRS. Higginson Is a woman Of more
penetration than gave her credit for II
she said that" said /. but, seriously,
dear, II your happiness hangs upon tree,
you shall have one"
II was between the soup and the fish, for
Elizabeth and by this time were seated
at our dinner table, which, bless her, she
likes to make bright aud sweet against my
home coming, that committed myself Ito
do, as the vaudeville bills would say, a
family tree for her.
For the first time noticed In my wife q
strange elation-a sort of suppressed supe-
riority. IL made her broaden all her as
when she spoke to me, and her dear, sweet
American voice came down from her nose
into her throat when she talked about be-
ing Colonial Dame" so that my wife
really became quite English In her discus
sion Of the subject, which had supposed
to be thoroughly American. Mrs. Hig-
ginson had left her, it seemed, with an
awful sense of all that 1t meant TO be q
Colonial dame Of the "great works." as
the reformers say, TO be done when every
body had "tree."
'Howi" / asked, for the mutton had
made me monosyllabic, but neither inele-
CANT nor aboriginal In my vocabulary, as
Elizabeth seemed to think from the horri-
fed way In which she looked at me before
she went on.
"In the first place, you know, dear, that
society In Old Haven II neither 30 gay nor
30 general as 10 might be II we weren't all
the time on pins and needles for fear we
might know somebody who wasn't, well,
quite so nice as ourselves, and Mrs. Hig-
ginson says that the Society Of @. D.-'a
capital name for some Of them, said In
parentheses-will do away with all that
sort Of thing. There are going to be meet
ings-lots Of them, and when they have
had enough meetings TO find out that ev-
erybody has an ancestor a. aristocratic as
everybody else, then they are going to un-
bend and be nice 10 one another, and the
swellest Of the lot are going to give din
ners and balls and it's going to be awful
ly exclusive and English, you know, and
II any woman's name Is put up for mem
bership that the other women don't like
she's going to be blackballed unless she
has great deal Of money. And lam sure,
dear, It's going to make lovely feeling
all through society, and it's just what this
stupid old stuck up town needs"
Not being able to grasp the cogency Of
my loved ones reasoning, took refuge In
cigar, while Elizabeth slipped her coffee
and went on with her prattle.
ALFRED, dear, do you know Mrs Bellfry
Buncombef She's the regent. She Is moro
swell than any one in town. Mrs. Higgin-
son says that for years she has kept her
self shut up from common people. She has
never spoken to or come in contact with a
trades person In her life, except once, when
abe had to order herring but she kept
him at distance through the telephone.
"Who, the herringi"
"How stupid you arei No, the trades
person"
These transcendent qualifications of
Mrs. Bunoombe for her high Office 30 I'm
pressed me that / straightway made for
my study, followed by Elizabeth, and we
lost no time In looking up the family Bi-
BILE.
After still hunt Of an hour or moro
this venerable tome was unearthed, lying
In company with one or two Rollo books
and volume Of "Pride and Prejudice"
In a cobwebbed corner Of the closet, where
kept my odds and ends, boots principally.
After we had removed the dust from the
book which no we'll regulated family
should be without, Elizabeth opened it and
turned to the family register, when, as II
by inspiration, her well manicured forefln-
ger lit upon the name Penelope Shaw.
'P. Shaw" exclaimed, but not In q
tone Of mockery-far from it-for In that
name I beheld the very root and source of
my Elizabeth's tree-the name Of my
wife's great great great grandmother
That was enough. We went from Shaw
to Shaw until the clock struck midnight.
The next day went to the rooms Of the
Historical society, the College library and
the free library on the scent Of dead Shaws.
/ became, as 1t were, an ancestral hound.
This, of course, meant q neglect Of several
minor issues OF a business nature In which
several thousands Of dollars were involved.
opened up a correspondence which inoa-
pacitated our postman for active service
for week. Gentlemen rose up all over the
country who offered to supply me with an
castors ut 20 much head. One generous
soul offered to got me up tree for the
modest sum Of 800. spurned his tempt
get Elizabeth up that tree, and IL was
alone who wouh do It.
Well, In a months time I had bagged
all the game I thought necessary In the
way Of great, greater, greatest grand par
ents, uncles, aunts, cousins, etc.-and
really q most respectable showing they
made, the ancestors Of my wife Elizabeth,
God fearing, fennel eating, church going,
uninteresting, law abiding, representative
New Englanders, all Of them. II butchers
and bakers, spinners and tanners prepon-
derated In the list, what Of thatf Was not
that the keynote Of the Mayflower emigra-
tion, to bake and butcher, spin and tan,
In colony of their own, unobstructed by
the snobbery Of Englandi
p. Shaw had q son, a butcher. To him
- n - a