The Cecil Whig. [volume] (Elkton, Md.) 1841-current, 1897-05-08
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DEACON BUNKER'S PROPOSAL

ten little Bunkers, instid of sitting here,
under the shadder of my own vine and fig
tree, making tatting for night-cap.
You think it's wonder | never got
married in my younger days. do We? How
old do We think am now, | wonder? Why
| am not half as old as l might be, and
everybody says | look ten year younger
than be- 1t is nat'ral to the Hansons to
look young alters.
Now, there was Grandmarm Hanson, she
was eighty-nine when she died, and she
had not gray spear of hair on her head
but she had wore wig for sixteen years,
because her head was a-cold. And there is
Aunt Hammer She is nigh onto seventy,
and has not got a decayed tooth in the
world! Had them all pulled out several
year ago, and she's gummed it ever sense.
Wonder | never got married, do we?
Why, bless your heart. | have had more
chances to change my condition than you
can shake stick at. | used to be a great
favorte with the fellers till they found out
that didn't calkerlate to marry none OF
them, and then they kinder got mad and
left off teasing me.
Deary me! how dreadfully johnny Gray
was in love with me. He used to be over
to our house the hcft OF the time. We've
burnt out more than two dozen taller dips
asserting up together. Marin, she would
scold the master aoout wasting candles 50
and pa, he s,'d hn ucant to charge john
with the boards his horse had gnawed off
the fence viii he was hjtched up await
ing lor John to finish up his counting. I've
got two sugar hearts now, tied together
with Il blue ribbon, that John give me;
and in the ijrr-room bureau there is a
buzIum pin with picter of Boston state
House into it, that he presented to me as a
New Years gift. 1t cost sevcnty-ivc cents
and he paid for it in white beans John
was dreadful ginerous Teller, dreadful,
dunno but what should have had him if
mis- nose hadn't been a little one sided but
| couldn I quite put up with that. was
afcard he might step out of the straight
path of moral reatitude il he follered his
nOsa.
Did he ever propott? Wall. no, not in
jet so many words, but he was a-dying
to for rs much as year. If | hadn't
a-heen so cool to him he would have pro-
posed forty times but alters when lie began
to hem and haw, rs men will afore they
pop the question, | would break out about
the weather, or the chickens, or the spotted
turkey, and that would throw him rite off
from the track He married my cousin,
Mary Sullivan, after de found 'twarn't no
use to expect nothing from me: and they
have got twelve children with red heads
and skew noses, and poodle dog Thank
goodness didn't have him.
Oh about last summer? Yes, to be shure.
That's what sot out to tell We about
That was Deacon Bunker that spanked me
then Missis Bunker had been dead about
six months. She was as nice a woman as
ever you seed died of information OF the
brains, in the forty-ninth year OF her age,
beloved by all who knew her. None knew
her but to love her, none named her but to
praise. That is what is on her tombstone
but them autigraphy on gravestones hain't
alters as nigh the truth as they might be
And Missis Deacon Bunker, though she was
a nice woman, had a temper of her own,
and more than once in her life she chased
the deacon round the chmley with the
broomstick, when he didn't walk a crack
to suit her.
AFTER she was dead about six months,
the deacon took to coming over to our
house. Twas Jest arter March meeting
that he began to come, and he followed it
up powerful close. And every time he
brought ii little two-quart baskit with him
but he never asked for anything in it, AMI
bymeby begun to mistrust that he Eerried
that to blind peoples eyes, so that they
neeGn't think that he was going accounting.
So never asked him il he wanted any
thing in his basket, as | suppose | should
have done if it hadn't a-been for my
suspicious.
Do you know the deacon? lie is dread
full slow kind of a man-never seems to
bring anything to head. He would 20
all day in half bushel, and never know
but what he had room enuff. He courted
Miss Bunker fifteen year, and then he
never would a-maraied her if she hadn't
told him that her wedding gowned was
getting so yallar and old-fashioned that it
wouldn't do to put it off any longer, and
upon that he spanked up and the knot was
tied.
pitied his lonely condition along about
the time he was a-visting me, awfully.
He would set an talk about how there was
nobody to make pickles and mince-p pies
over to his house, and | would take some
pains to have some nice vittles for him
whenever he'd come. And be would set
an eat and talk about Miss Bunker and
the tears would run down his nose, and he
would wipe them off with his yaller ban
danner and take another doughnut. My