The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1904-03-20
By Martha McCulloch-W Williams.

enough to be married in"
That was what old John Wheatley
id to his daughter Susanna, when
came asking him for white frock
,ainst her wedding day. The Wheat
Us lived in Dinwiddie County, Wir-
MIA. Old Bob had land and negroes
rich farm, in fact and was, more
-er. mighty thrifty person.
But this was back in the fall of 1887,
hen, although the colonies had won
dependence, nobody knew exactly
hat they were going to do with it.
lready Old Bob had lost heavily
rough patriotism. He did not go to
yht himself, but bent every energy to
,ntals. AS a result, he had a chestful
Continental currency. The worst
ing about it was that only a part
it represented his crops of corn and
con. He had exchanged for some of
Z several hundred good English
AIneaS.
Nor was that all Tarleton, harry
Q the countryside, had sacked his
)use. The soldiers had made bon
in the front yard of everything in
e way of clothes or linen. Susanna
ghed whenever she thought of it.
hey had burned her mothers we'd
ng gown, to say nothing of her beau
Jul second-day's silk, shot thing OF
nix and green. Susanna could just
early remember it; it had been i'll
ding, and she was going to be mar
ed herself at the mature age OF
venteen. Her sweetheart, William
ajors, was rising eighteen, so there
-ould be age enough in the family.
ne wished she had the silk dress, but
1t as she 1onged for the white muslin
it'll tamboured flowers all over it and
ills of soft lace in the neck. Her
other must have looked beautiful in
Since it got burned, Susanna
fought what a pity it was they had
1 1t buried her in it. She had died the
; ar before the great raid.
\ There was stepmother, of course
L plain, peace-1oving soul, who said,
i I'd stuck to it: 4 shan't neither mix
7r NEEDLE. Bob Wheatley, between
II 1u and your children. If trouble
III 1mes. it'll be none O my maxim
VI So there was no use in asking her
elp. Susanna did not wholly blame
ar father. Nearly all trading was in
after, and it did seem sinful to give a
hole hundred-weight of stripped and
noothed tobacco for one ell of white
llus1in. Yet that was the rate in
setersburg- William Majors hadfound
blt for her when he went UP to buy
S own blue broadcloth coat and new
-anllin small clothes He was in
ined to be foppish, being an orphan
18th a fair inheritance. She could not
ear to think of standing up beside
i'm, either in checked homespun or
j the brown stuff that was the only
iternative.
I'll have a white frock if you won't
NV it for me- she said, with her head
igh. looking her father in the face.
lie turned away, chuckling, Chip o
ne old blockw but twenty yards off
turned to halloo: IF you do, Miss
mpudence, you'll owe it all to your
WIN hands"
The wedding was six weeks off.
}usy weeks they were for Susanna.
he put down a pound of seed cotton
4 front Of the fire every night after
upper, and sat picking out the seeds
mill she had turned the pound into
our ounces of clean lint. The next
hing was to make the lint into fiat
ish balls, as big as two hands, and
Dap them over carefully, damping the
lbre lightly all through. Unless it
vas thus soaped and dampened it
would never spin fine, even thread.
Next morning, by daylight, she was
lp, and at her cards. By breakfast
inc she had a fine pile of beautiful
1eecy rolls heaped on the bench Of her
zig spinning wheel.
By nine o'clock she had spun up all
he first carding, so she sat down, not
% rest. but to make more rolls. Card
No them was much harder work than
pinning-even spinning warp, which
must be twisted twice. Mrs. Wheat
ey spun everything cotton. or
ow-on the hax-wheel, often sitting
1t it all day long. Susanna liked the
pig wheel better It was nearly as
much fun as dancing, running back
20 draw the thread, keeping the wheel
oir-r-ing all the while, then checking
t, twirling it afresh, and running up
the length of thread on the breach.
Warp-thread she let drop after the
first drawing and twisting, set her
fingers on it at the spindle-tip, and
went down the length again, making
the wheel bir-r harder than ever. Thus
it was double work, so she was wise
to do it first. She spun we'll, making
round thread beautifully even.
When a breach was as big as the
spindle could well carry, she slipped
it off, put on a fresh piece of corn
Ihusk to serve as the foundation of an
other, and, after she had spun few
= threads, sat down to reel what she had
just spun.
Keeling was all important The
clock-reel measured both what she
had done and how she had done it.
She was spinning nine-hundred
thread: her allotment of lint must
make so many cuts of it, else the web
would be uneven. A cut, understand,
: is hundred and forty four rounds
upon the reel, whose spread is such
( that hanks are exactly yard long.
By nine-hundred thread weaver
understands thread of such size that
nine hundred strands of it, side by
Side. will make yard-wide web of the
right thickness. But the web will
have really eighteen hundred threads
for it is always in two sheets that the
wool goes between. 1t takes as much