Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1899-11-30

"You can never really appreciate
what boarding means until you are
paying guest, as our English cousins
say, in some Virginia household.
It was at q women's luncheon, and
! the speaker was a pretty, 0ark-eyed
matron, just returned from a summer
spent in the Blue Ridge. The expert
ence was a novel one, but while it last
ed the boarder did not always see the
funny side.
Il never knew before" she went on,
that gentle-folks resorted to such
means of making livelihood, but l
| find it is quite unusual to see any home
there without it's foreign inmate. 1t
costs them nothing, as you simply go as
one of the family, and there is no ques-
ton of landlady and patron: it is sim
ply that one lady is the guest of an
other, and, in a perfectly delicate, I'M
obstrusive way, contributes her share
to the general fund.-
do go into particulars, urged sew
eral voices. 1T sounds so interest
ing"
eff you really want to hear it, l will
tell you about my case. They are all
alike. Colonel Mason was gentleman
farmer, and spent most of his time go
ing through the plantation on horse
back or doing in the sun, with glass
of something beside him. A widowed
daughter and her little boy lived at
home, and there were two young Ia
dies, beside the grandparents, and
bow Of II. Wants were many, and the
wherewithal to meet them scanty. SO
GUSTS said one day, triumphantly:
Mother, let's take bOarders!
The house is very small, and the
available space crowded to the utmost,
and this fact Mrs. Mason mildly sug-
gested.
"'Well. we can have one anyway,
single lady. or even two on a pinch.
I'll give up my little room, and go IN
with Matoaca and sister. 1t won't cost
a cent, and, maybe, we can make
enough out of it for me to go to Savan-
nah this winter.
$50 an advertisement appeared IN
w
answered it, and on a certain summer
evening, about dusk, | arrived at
Woods Crossing. AS the polite brake
man helped me down | saw, in the hall
light, a crowd of people pressing for
ward and l was a trife disconnected
when a handsome veteran past middle
life raised his shapeless nat calamity
and said:
Mrs. Strangely? Co mel Mason,
madam, at your service. Your satchel,
if YOU please. This is my wife, MRS.
Mason; my daughters, Ns.oaca and
Custis; my daughter, Mrs. Murray;
Mason Murray, my little grandson.
May l have the honor of presenting you
to my wife's parents, Major and Mrs.
Delaney? Children, see to MRS.
Strangely's trunk, and relieve her OF
her umbrella. Will you accept my
arm, madam
Mrs. Mason was a high-bred, re-
fned-looking faded woman, bearing
the scars of lifetime of drudgery and
privation. and the married daughter
odd beauty was almost gone at %, after
six years of welded hardship. GUSTS
and Matoaca, as they climbed the hill
beside me, saw were startlingly pref
ty girls, dressed cheaply, in eager iml-
tation of the style of year
ago. All talked frankly and cor
daily, and it was with much
heartiness that l was left alone with
the gallant colonel, who insisted on
making me julep. / declined, and /
was wondering wistfully if drinking
took the place of eating in this
strange house, when little Mason
head was stuck through the door.
sGrandma's got your supper ready he
said and vanished as he came.
"The clock was striking 9 as | fol-
lowed the colonel across low-pitched
hall. 1anked with black mahogany
high-backed sofas and chairs, into the
large. dark, wainscoted dining-room
where a single dim kerosene lamp
smoked on the huge, highly-polishad
table.
"Do come in, Mrs. Strangely my
hostess said, rising to meet me. Tn
sorry you will have such an uncom-
Portable meal, but my son, Tucker
went off to a party tonight and we hat
an early supper on his account. viii
YOU let me give you cold tea or coffee
Matoaca, fill Mrs. Strangely's glass
with milk
Eagerly pressing each dish upor
me, the entire household stood ready
to answer every unspoken wish, and
wondered if they had left anything fol
the morrow There was broiled chick
en-, cold ham and lamb, potato salad
soft boiled eggs, hot biscuit and Sail!
Lunn, hoe-cake and cornmeal mullins
strawberry preserves and organe jelly
heavenly sponge cake and a great
, thick slice of black fruit-cake a yea
old. clabber and apples cooked in but
: ter and sugar, with cream thick enough
to cut. It was feast fit for king.
: "Afterward we sat in the fine, GOV
cred stone porch, with the Clipped, vel
low columns and new green benche
running along the sides. They talke'
freely and intimately of Epictetus an
Plutarch, spoke of old Dan Chaucer g
friend and had never heard of Drey
fus. The white-haired grandfathe
l quoted Spanish verse and told Of hi
travels through Florida in the earl
20's: and in the midst of it all prett
[ Matoaca broke off to ask me if side
i combs were still in fashion and wheth
: er | thought there was any truth j
the rumor that overskirts were to
worn again.
e when I went up for the night N