St. Landry clarion. (Opelousas, La.) 1890-1921, 1896-01-04
WEDDING TOMBSTONE q.
Bv oLARroE /. CLINaHAN.

most abiect ignorance and lmmedlabely
drew up to the fire. This was partly to.
gain information and partly because.
although the fireplace was wide and
deep-throated and big logs were blazing
in it, there were biting draughts OF OF
stinging air coming in at the loosely-f1t-.
ting door. For grandmother would not
be persuaded to leave the home that had.
been hers for SO years, and which now
showed some signs Of decay. She sat
knitting vigorously by the firei1ght,
for, although she had all the modern
conveniences of heating and lighting,
her big fireplace cast its ruddy glow
out into the room through all the long
winter evenings. was an angular
schoolgirl Of 15 then, with a great love
of the romantic, and was on a four
weeks visit at the old homestead. It
seemed never to occur to grandma that,
having been raised in different part OF
the country, the happenings at Ragged
Corner (where she Hved) would nat
urally be unknown to me. She always
expressed fresh surprise at my lg-
norance on these subjects. After knit nit
ting few minutes in silence, she be-
gan:
you've seen the old stone house down
on the bank of the river, all shut in with
pines and evergreens? It's nigh hun
dred years old When was born it Ets4 had
been built ten years. When I was g
Young married woman the Barbours
came to.liye there, and they were proud
lligh-feelin' people that nobody could
get acquainted with. That's what made
'em take it so dretful hard when-buf
,ahere I am, way head of my story. You
. ae, Mr.. Barbour embezzled or did some,
d. ag of that kind, and went to prison
Gyie VIC = an his wife and little boy shut
4 to ioingsaAEgood deal of schoolin'. hi
= Isl my heaaxseed she taught him her
~ osss long as she could, and then hs
bsuL i books and studied by. himself
| He Ta.Nd going to school when he was
small boy, but one Of the scholars
| threw Ii at him about his father, and
| Mortimer nearly killed him, and aftel
| that his mother KEEP him home. And sht
| was such proud woman, was Mis- Bar
boir, and lofty and severe in her ways
She wouldn't let nobody sympathiz'
with her, which everybody wanted to
as there's so little going on in plact
| like Ragged Corner Mis- Barbour wa.
real selfish with her grief, SO she gother
| self dislfked, besides folks bein' sus
piciots after the way her husband
| turned out. What did they live on
oh, the boy farmed it, and later they dt
say he wrote books on what they called
| natural history, though to my mind i
was the most unnatural stuff I evel
heard tell of all about beetles and bug
| with 300 muscles In their heads, and a
could carry 1000 times their own weigh
on their own backs, which every ybod,
knows he. must have got up as. he wen
along. They were dretfully taken VI
with each other, he and his mother
and she believed every thing he said wa
so, even about the bugs and beetles
But She was his own born mother, ane
| that explains 1T. y s5.,
"When she died, Mortimer liked b
j went crazy. He planted her grave witt
vi'lets and pansies, and at the head wa
awhile marble monument he had gon.
to the city for-nothing nearer woult
suit him. But he didn't display no taste
Nothing on II, my dear, but the oil
lady's name and the date she dfed-no