The Ely miner. [volume] (Ely, Minn.) 1895-1986, 1905-12-15
what others didn't read. he
| alone.

read.
| He fairly revealed in the "guesstofi-
al" histories of little known eras, AID
loved to grope in the shadows OF pre-
| historic twilight, and to stub his toes
against the rocks of forgotten ages,
He would quiet his headaches with
musty doses of the non-understand-
able.
He knew more about the unknown
than many people knew about the
known. He was an exitless storehouse
of all the dry bones of art, science and
| literature-the unmoistened cinders OF
long-dead fires. When anybody wanted
to know something not worth knowing
about, he asked father about 1t, and
father told him.
But with all his eccentricities, and
his overdoings, father didn't neglect
his profession; oiling first, reading
afterward. He kept the birth-recorder
buster than the tombstone-cutter.
The attractiveness of opposites was
exemplified in my parents mutual mat
rimonial selection. When my to-be-l
father went my to-be-mother hunting,
he found the one woman in all wom-
andom farthest removed from what he
was or ever could be.
Fathers and mothers resemblance
to each other was limited to their
representativeness of humankind
Father was as tough as 8 seashore7
seasoned plough OK; and he knew ii,
and gloried in it. He felt his strength
and used it. He was the strongest
man on Cape Cod-was able to stand
more, and he did stand more, than
anybody else 1t never occurred to
him to take care of himself. Really,
he hardly knew he had physical body
and certainly he never gave it any at
tention. He outraged nature and ma
ture didn't seem to retaliate.
Mother thought she was as weak as
chilled fly in autumn. She wasn't,
but she thought she was and governed
herself accordingly.
Father was nervous; every nerve he
had stood on its edge and quarrelled
with its neighbors.
Mother hadn't any locatable nerves,
as ordinary nerves go. She suffered,
or thought she did, from three-quar-
tiers OF all the weaknesses woman Is
heir to, but the seat of her trouble
never got below her head.
Father never slept. Mother slept
her eight full hours day.
If father wanted anything, all Cape
Cod knew it, and hustled to help him
to get it.
If mother wanted anything, she con-
sidered the matter until she forgot
she wanted it, and consequently didn't
get it.
Father believed in "Activanity."
Mother worshiped "Passivanity."
Father trusted in God and went
armed. "
Mother trusted in God and kept her
powder wet.
But they got along nicely together.
When mother did anything father
didn't like. or didn't do something he
wanted her to do, he called an immedi-
ate session, and the assembly voted
unanimously his way.
If fathers actions didn't please
mother, she prayed over them, and
Heaven answered her prayer by max
ing her forget all about them.
Mother had the record of never do
ing anything wrong. Maybe she was
never actively engaged in aggressive
right-doing; but she never, never did
anything she shouldn't have done. She
moved in her own way; often got in
her own way without knowing it; and
travelled in the way of her fathers
and her mothers. She kept right in
the middle of the old-fashioned road,
SHE'D neither to the right nor to the
left, but plodded on and on, doing the
same to-day that she did yesterday,
and sure to do tomorrow the same
that she had done to-day.