The Vermont watchman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1883-1911, 1895-11-27
The Night Before Thanksgiving.
CHAPTER |

CHAPTER
There was q sad heart in the low
storied, dark little house that stood
humby by the roadside under some
tall elms. Small as her house was, old
Mrs. Robb found it too large for herself
alone; che only needed the kitchen and
q tiny bedroom that led out of it, and
there still remained the best room and
the bedroom, with the low garnet over.
head.
There had been time, after she was
left alone, when Mrs. Robb could help
those who were poorer than herself.
She kept COW, and was strong enough
not only to do woman's work inside
her house, but almost a mans work out
side in her piece of garden ground. At
last sickness and age had come hand in
hand, those two relentless enemies Of
the poor, and together they had wasted
her strength and substance. She had
always been looked up to by her neigh
bors as being independent, but now she
was left, lame-footed and lame.handed,
with debt to carry and her bare land Z,
and the house provisioned to stand
the siege of time.
For awhile she managed to get on,
but at last it began to be whispered
about that it was no use for anyone 10
be 80 proud; it was easier for the whole
town to care for her than for few
neighbors, and Mrs, Robb had better
90 TO the poor-house befo winter, and
be done with it. AT this terrible sug-
gestion her brave heart seemed to stand
still. The people whom she cared for
tA Lo CHI
could no longer 60 into their house
holds to make herself of use. The very
elms overhead seemed to say " No" as
they groaned in the late autumn winds,
and there was something appealing
even to the strange passer-by in the
look of the little gray house with
Mrs. Robb's pale, worried face at the
window.
CHAPTER II.
Someone has said that anniversaries
are days TO make other people happy in,
but sometimes, when they come, they
seem to be full of shadows; and the
power Of giving joy 10 others, that in
alienable right which ought to tighten
the saddest heart, the most indifferent
sympathy, sometimes even this seems
to be withdrawn.
So poor old Mary Ann Robb sat at
her window on the afternoon before
Thanksgiving and felt herself poor and
sorrowful indeed. Across the frozen
road she looked eastward over great
stretch of cold meadow land, brown
and windswept and crossed by icy
bitches. II seemed to her as if in all
the troubles that she had known and
carried before this there had always
been some hope to hold, as if she had
never looked poverty full in the face
and seen its cold and pitiless look be-
fore. She looked anxiously down the
road, with horrible shrinking and
dread at the thought of being asked,
out of pity, to join in some Thanksgiv-
ing feast, but there was nobody coming
with gifts in hand. Once she had been
full of love for such days, whether al
home or abroad, but something had
chilled her very heart now, poor old
woman.
Her nearest neighbor had been fore
most of those who wished her to 60 to
the town farm, and he had said more
..ssssn once that it was the only sensible
Thing. But John Mander was waiting
impatiently to get her tiny farm into
his own hands; he had advanced some
money upon it in her extremity, aud
pretended that there was still debt,
after he had cleared her wood lot to
DAY himself back. He would plow over
the graves In the field corner and fell
the great elms, and waited like spider
for his poor prey. He had often re-
preached her for being too generous to
worthless people in the past and com
ing to be charge tosothers now. Oh
if she could only die in her own house
and not suffer the pain OF homelessnes'
and dependence
1t was Just at sunset, and, as she
looked out hopelessly across the gray
fields, there was a sudden CLEAN o.
light far away on the low hills beyond
the clouds opened in the west and lie
the sunshine through. One Lowell,
CLEAN shot swift as an arrow ant
frightened far cold hillside where
fell, and at the same moment suddel
CLEAN of hope frightened the winte
landscape Of her heart.
"There was Johnny Harris" sal
Mary Ann, softly. "He was soldier
son, LEFT an orphan and distressed. OF
John Mander scolded, but / couldn'
see the poor boy want l kept hir
hat year after he got hunt, spite
what anybody said, an he helped m
what little he could. He said | we
the only mother he'd ever had. II
goin' out West, Mother Robb,' says HI
Il ehau't come back till get rich, al
then he'd look at me an laugh, f
pleasant and boysh. He WANT or
that liked to write. | don't think
was dom very we'll when / heard
there, it's years ago now. l awa,
thought if he got sick or anything
tsEE FOURTH COLUMN