St. Landry clarion. (Opelousas, La.) 1890-1921, 1896-06-13
LYDIA WHEELOCK.
BY MARY Il. WILKINS.


/ We all agree thar Lydia Wheelock j:
very plain looking, but that she i
very good. Size was never handsome
eren. as girl. She never had any youth
full bloom, and her figure was alway.
as clumsy and awkward as it is now
Poor Lydia, with her round shoulder:
and her high hips, always moved hesv
ily among the light-tripping maids O
her own age. Seen from behind, hel
broad, matronly back made her lool
cid enough to be the mother of then
sail. Bright and delicate girlish rib
bons and muslins, which set off theil
happy, youthful, fower-like faces, made
poor Lydia's dull, thick cheeks looh
e!uller and thicker and heavier.
Some women, as plain-yisaged as
Lydia, seeing themselves, as it were
like dingy barnyard fowls among
1ocks of splendid snowy doves and hum
ming birds, might have deliberately
tried to cultivate loving kindness and
sweet obligingness of manner as al
offset. But Lydia was not brilliant
enough for that, neither had she such
personal ambition. It is doubtful il
she had ever looked in the glass much
except to ascertain if her face was clean
and her hair smooth, and If her lack OF
eome1iness ever cost her an anxious
hour.
AS a child at school Lydia never whis-
4oI, 1,,,, fol lal
her lessons, and never teased away an
other girls candy. Besides, her mother
always vouched for the fact hat she was
as good as a young and tender infant,
and consequently seemed to have been
actually born good.
"Lyddy never cried, except when she
was real sielS,' her mother used to say.
fShe lived to be very old woman, and
narped upon her good daughter as if
size were the favorite string of her
whole life.) "Never knowed her to cry
because she was mad, as the other chill
dren did. Lyddy alters took her nap
regular an slept all night without
fussin'. An she never banged her head
on the floor cause she couldn' have her
own way. She alters give in real pleas
ant and sn1ilin'"
What was true of Lydia as a baby has
undoubtedly been true of her ever since
she has callers give in real pleasant
an smilin'." There may be some peo-
pie who would urge the plea that Lydia
had an easy temperament, and not nat
urally such a firm clutch upon her de-
'sires that it is agony torelinquish them.
Eut if all the. ways that Lydia has pa
tiehtly and smilingly accepted have
leen her own ways, she must, even if
her temperament had been ever so stolid,
have had peculiar tastes and likings.
Sometimes it would have been almost
like a relish for the scalping- knife or
the branding-iron. II Lydia has not,
1netaphorically speaking, many times
during her life banged her head upon
the floor, it has not been for lack of
proper temptation. She has had from
ony human standpoint a hard life. Her
father died when she was young girl.
She had to leave school and go about
Helping the neighbors with sewing and
cleaning and extra household tasks
when. they had company, to earn pit
tsnce for the support Of herself and
her mother. Lydia's mother, although
she lived to be SO old, was always
feeble woman. crippled with rheu-
matism.
Lydia lived patiently and laboaiously,
earning just enough to keep her mother
comfortably and herself unconfort-
ably alive, and that was all. She had
one good meal a day when she was
working at a neighbor's. Often we
know that was all she had, although
she never said SO and never complained.
Her mother never went without her
three meals day and her warm fan
nels, when the dread of Lydia's life was
that she might faint away some day al
q neighber's from lack of proper nour-
ishment, aud tfle state of her attire in
be discovered. She con-
fessed her great dread to somebody
once, after she was married.
When Lydia was about 80 she sud-
denly got married. to the surprise of the
whole village. Nobody had dreamed
she would ever marry. She was 50
plain and SO poor, and seemed years
older than she was-old enough TO be
her own grand1nother,a Mrs. Harrison
White said. She married man who
had paid some attention to Mrs. Harri-
son White when she was a girl, and
she was popularly supposed to favor
him.. but her parents objected, SO she
married Harrison White instead.
Elisha Wheeloek, the man Lydia mar
ried, all the neighbors had called ''a
poor tool" He was good-looling and
good hearted, but seemed to have lit
lie ambition and little taste for indus
.ry. Moreover, everybody said he
frank. Lurinda Smell said she had |
,een him when he could scarcely walk,
md many others agreed with her. Al
hough the village was surprised the
'illage gave a sort of negative approval
# the banns. Everybody agreed that
man like Wheelock couldn't hope to do |
my better. No pretty girl with a good
lome would forsake il for hiIza, and as
or Lydia, it was probably her first and
MY chance, and she could never hope
0 do any better either. Moreover,
elisha owned comfortable ho1se--his
ather had just died and left it to him, /
With quite a good-sized farm; and it
vas said positively that Lydia's mother
vas to live there. 'LYdia.s got a good
ome for herself and her mother if
Lisha don't drink it mp people said.