The Wilmington daily Republican. (Wilmington, Del.) 1890-1902, 1900-04-26
BY GILBERT PARKER.

HE was no uncle Of mine, but Il
pleased me that he let me call him Uncle
Jim," said Mr.. Park. For 40 years hi
and his worn faced wife bowed them
selves beneath the yoke, first to pay fol
the 100 acre farm and then to bring ur
and educate their seven children.
Something noble in them gave them
ambitions for their boys and girls which
they had never had for themselves, but
when they had passed 40 years, in which
the little farm had twice been mort.
gagged to put the eldest son through col.
lcgc as doctor, they faced the bitter
fact that the farm had passed from them
to Sidney, the second son, who had come
at last to keep hotel in q town 80
miles away.
"But the great blow came when Sidney
married the designing miliner who
Haunted her wares opposite his barroom,
and somehow from the date of that mar
riage Sidney's good fortune and the no.
tel declined.
when he and his wife first visited the
little farm after their marriage, the old
mother shrank away from the young
woman's painted face, and an added sad
ness always showed in her bearing and
in her patient smile afterward.
"But she took Sidney's vito through
the house, showing her all there was to
show, though that was not much.
ut was not much of home, as any
one can see with the minds eye, but four
stalwart men and three fine women had
been born, raised and quartered there
until, with good clothes and speaking de-
cent English and with money in their
pockets, hardly got by the old people, one
by one they issued forth into the world.
But the pert milliner saw nothing of
all this She looked into the face which
Gods finger had anointed and mother
hood had etched with trouble and said
"''Tisn't much, is 1t? Only clap
board house and no ceilings up stairs and
rag carpets pshaw"
But the real crisis came when Sidney,
having stood at the woodhouse door and
blown the dinner horn as he used to do
when a boy, the sound floating and
crying away across the ryeficld, the old
man came, for, strange to say, that was
the one sound he could hear easily.
though, as he said to himself, it seemed
as small as u pin, coming from ever so
far away.
He came heavily up from the barn
yard, hopping his red face and forehead
and now and again raising his hand to
shade his eyes, concerned to see the un-
known visitors, whose horse and buggy
We're in the stable yard.
HE and Sidney greeted outside warm
ly enough, but there was some trepida-
ton, too, in Uncle Jim's face. He felt
trouble brewing, and there is no trouble
like that which comes between parent
and child. Silent as he was, however, he
had large and cheerful heart, and, nod
ding his head, he laughed the deep,
quaint laugh which Sidney himsclf.of all
his sons had, and he was fonder Of Sid
ney than any.
''He washed his hands in the little
basin outside the woodhouse door, comb
ed out his white beard, rubbed his red,
wately etes, tied clean handkerchief
around his neck, put on rusty but clean
old coat apd.. minute, aftcEward, was
shaking hands for the first time with
Sidncy's wife.
"He had lived much apart from his
kind, but he had mind that fastened
upon thought and worked it down until
It was IN axiom.
"He felt how shallow was this thin,
woman Of founces and cheap
rouge. He saw her sniff at the brown
sugar-she had always had white at the
hotel-and he noted that she let Sidney's
mother clear away and wash the dinner
things herself.
HE felt the little crack of doom before
It came.
1T came about 3 o'clock.
HE did not return to the ryefeld after
Inner, but staid and waited to hear
what Sidney had to say. Sidney did not
tell his little story well, for he himself
toresaw trouble in the old home, but he
mad to face this and all coming dilemmas
10 best he might.
with kind of shamefacedncss, yet
with an attempt to carry the thing off
lightly, he told Uncle Jim, while inside
ais wife told the old mother, that the
business Of the hotel had gone to pot Che
lid not say who was the cause of that
Ind they were selling out to his partner
md were coming to live on the farm.
I'm tired anyway of the hotel job
aid Sidney. EARNINGS better life.
Don't You think SO, dad!
cts better for me, Sid,' answered
Uncle jim; it's better for me-
Sidney was little uneasy. But
Won't it be better for me| he asked
'Mebbc,' was the slow answer; 'meb-
re-, mebbe So
"'And then there's mother; she's get.
Ing too old for the work, amt sheT
"'She's done it straight along an
wered the old man, straight along until
Iow.'
"'But Lizzie can help her, and we'll
ave hired girl, ehl'
al dunno, Dunno was the brooding |
nswer. The place amt going to stand
IT,
"'Oh, we'll get more out of IT, an
wered Sidney. I'll stock it up, I'll put
1ore under barley, and I'll get reaper
nd mower All the thing wants is
vorking, dad. Put more in, get more
ut. Now, amt that right?
"The other was looking off toward the
yefeld, where for 40 years up and down
he hillside he had travelled with the