The Scranton tribune. [volume] (Scranton, Pa.) 1891-1910, 1894-12-01

hoped to leave his family a good sum
of money, to buy a comfortable life in
surance before he should be taken
away, but the necessities of the mo-
ment always hid the fear of the future.
He had lost what money he had by the
failure of a bank, and he had never
been provident. 1t was the rainy day
of the moment and not of the future
with which he concerned himself. Now
that the small bills that could be col
lected were all paid, many accounts
having never been kept at all and still
more forgiven-it was but poor de-
pendence, and the girls were wondering
what they could possibly do. One had
inherited her fathers gift of teaching,
and had gathered a little school, but it
was more thing of love than of bust
ness, and of late she had taken the dis
trict school near at hand, and her poor
pay was the mainstay that was left.
They had always felt so rich all their
lives that they did not know how to
feel poor, exactly. In the late years
when DR.. Ashurst had been sent for far
and wide, and now and then a large fee
came in his way, they had begun to
feel like people of fortune. And only
the last Thanksgiving day, the fort
night before his three days illness be-
gan, what joy they had in making hap
piness for many poor households! The
old chaise had gone it's rounds with a
high-heaped mound of benefactions
under the buffalo robe, and this old
woman must have this thing to make
her happy, and the other something
else, for Thanksgiving was still kept in
all its glory of neighborliness and good
cheer in Alton, and Christmas itself
seemed to be the happier for young
people, because their elders and betters
made the most of the earlier festival.
The doctors study, where light was
apt to burn so late on winter nights,
was plain room full of books, with a
great desk and some three-cornered
chairs which had been old DR.. Ashurst's s
before they belonged to our friend,
whom the elder people still call the
young doctor There was a curious dry
odor of drugs and Russia leather bind
ings. There was huge wasp's nest on
one bookcase. and bust of Dante on
the other, and beautiful old engrav-
ing of Sydenham hanging on the wall.
One could not help finding it charm
ing, scholarly sort of place; there was
still a delightful air of sympathy and
frlendliness, as of place where people
were sure to come to tell their troubles,
and sure to go away comforted.
1t was the day before Thanksgiving,
and one of the doctors daughters, who
had oftenest been his companion, was
sitting there alone. She had been look
ing at the books and making list OF
some of them, about which one of hei
fathers friends had written her. He
had made a good offer, out of friendli-
ness, but both DR.. Ashursts had known
what good books We're, and had left be
hind them some volumes of very great
value. OF course they must sell them
and 1t was a good chance, but Nelly
Ashurst loved these particular books
and treasured them all the more be-
cause her father and grandfather hat
treasured them too. She took dowr
the old copy of the Religio Medici, anC
held 1t for a moment-then she kissed
dt and put it up again, and went ovel
ITO the old desk to lay her head on hei
folded arms and cry. The night before
proposal had come from her mothers
sister in one of the seaboard towns, tha
they two should come to her to spent
the winter, leaving the eldest sister
who was the teacher, to board some
where and go on with her school, II
the summer they could perhaps let thel
house, for Alton was near one of tn,