The times. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1890-1903, 1900-12-09
Lace Curtains and Portieres

and the woman she had raised, who, by
the way, was a irift-child from foreign
ship wrecked near Alexandria, and whose
name no one ever knew, died the next day
or same night from grief, and both ola
ladies-one the mistress, the other faith
! full servant Nancy, seventy odd-were in
cluded in the same grave. That was away
back in the fOrties, and Mrs. Hamilton
still recalls vividly the personalities of
each.
When Mrs. Hamilton came to Newcastle
she was an educated lady, and she was
of the old school. when ladies did not
fashionably go Stunning and get UP in
meeting and harangue their wicked
neighbors or misguided friends. Still Mrs.
Hamilton found plenty to do in her capac-
ity of Doctors wife, and she tllsd her po-
sition with all modesty and wisdom and
such dainty dignity as would shame the
harum-scaru1n young woman in furs and
feathers, whose presence in the CABINS Oh
the abjectiy poor nowadays is manifestiy
offensive For in some poor cabins in the
remote Businesses of these mountains peo-
pie live who never saw a silver SPOON and
the doctor had to carry one as Scrupu-
lousy as his saddle pockets. There were
other simple needfuls that Mrs. Hamilton
kept on hand together with her Wonderiul
Christian charity and justice and mercy
so poignant in the hearts of the old blue
stocking Presbyterians of the Valley.
When for instance, in a remote cabin,
the cedar churn had to be set in motion
to secure the necessary oil for the newly
arrived infants velvetty skin; and other
pioneer resources always within the reach
of the poor mountaineer, and with when
he becomes contented in two or three
cenerations-theSe conditions under which
Mrs Hamilton lived here made Of her
heroine and she could not fail to be APP
preciated by those who knew her. Nhen
the old woman in the bake-shop opposite
her house. got hlariously intoxicated, and
fought with her customers, and whose de-
scendantS, by the way, are prominent peo-
pie in some sections of the, country in the
present generation, Mrs. Hamilton felt
as,grievcd, because the old bake-shop wo-
man was one of the peopls' upon whom
she depended for society. When, nearly
sixty years ago, barrel of Whlskey was
rolled into the middle OF the street, and
all the little boys in caps and rotld-aDouts
armed with long rye straws helped them
selves. and she had to witness it from her
quiet library window, knowing that he nus
band would have to work to keep them
alive during the coming night all the ilne
philosophy of Hannah Moore, as she read
the volume inside her little home, could
not wholly reconcile her to the sight OF the
babies debauchery.
CHRISTMAS OF OLD.
When all the men gathered in their
Christmas glce for the drunken orgies over
the cock-fshtinS or the turkey shootings,
it was not Mrs. Wharton who accompanied
her husband on his journeys to mend the
slashed throats, or the bullet wounds, or
the kicks and bruises of the battles, but
she was up waiting for him on his return.
There were no drugs sold nearer than
thirty miles distant, and DR.. Wharton
kept his own drugs and made his own blue
mass pills. Much OF his nateria medica
Mrs. Wharton learned, because she had
much call for the same in his absence.
Then, once upon a sad time, he went out
into the chill mountain Businesses to pay
a professional call to some sufferer. He
neglected to take his big fur overcoat, and
the same blizzard that visits us occa-
siOnally now put his ugly wings to lash
the air and swept down the mountains
with terrible force, congealinS the mois- 1
ture into icy points like needles, and DIR.
Wharton was caught in it and chilled to
the bone From that chill he took pneu-
mOnid and died.
His fine library-one Of the finest coliec-
lions OF books in the State at the time, for
he was, besides being DR..
literary gentleman of wide culture-was
scattered about and finally destroyed dur
ing Gen. AverlIS raid through here, in the
years of commissions that followed At one
time, when, by the long stage-coach and
carriage journeys, Dr.. Wharton had d box
expressed to him from Philadelphia it had
a strange adventure. He was wont to get
oranges, and loaf sugar, and fine books,
and cut-glass, or fine china, and innumer-
able little daintieS of silks and SatinS for
his wife, in express packages from the dis
tant cities, which We're not dealt in in the
towns near, so when this especial box was
passed on, 1t was treated very nicely and
treasured WITH care. Upon one occasion it
was slowed under a lady's bed in the
absence OF her gentleman, and the pres
ence of many slaves. at a country house.
Finally, it reached its destination in New
castle, and proved to be-a skeleton all
the way from New York, with his teeth
and his ribs as white as snow-a beautiful
skeleton for the Dr.'s office The lady who
slept with 1t under her bed had a genteel
fit Of hysterla when she heard of him, for
no man, dead or alive, is welcome to rest
under Iady's bed.
Mrs. HAMILTON.
Mrs Sarah Hamilton as she ie now
represents. therefore, a lady identified
with all that was worth remembering Of !
Newcastle and the countv's mast. When I
she was born 1T was Botetourt county |
and her home was near Fincestle, on the !!
old stage line between Charleston and !
T.ynchburg. She was sent to school in the I
distant towns and was furnished with a I
goyerness and dancing master, and was
in her young days a fine lady in fine at
fire, such as one may see in an old copy |
of Godey's Magazine. That meant good |
deal in those days. for US far back as
21sst, her father, with his own slaves, built