Los Angeles herald. [microfilm reel] (Los Angeles [Calif.]) 1900-1911, 1908-02-02

erence, missed a chance or excuse for
chat Her favorte theme was little missy"
the baby she had tended faithfully and SO
deeply mourned, and scarcely day passed with
out some tale of the sweetness and intelligence
of this lost darling
Il am afraid you would have spoiled her had
she lived, Harriet said one day.
Charybdis drew herself up. "Missis, l
spiles chd-never! l gives them all they
wants and all their hearts DESIRE | never crosses
them and spiles their dispositions
Her standard perfection, and, like most of
us, she kept it to measure others by. This prin-
ciple applied conveniently to her dealings with
her own race. She would rarely pay a colored
person for dressmaking other work
NO don't pay for such no-account sewing
as that | overheard her saying day. BE
sides, you KEEP that dress three weeks, and reck-
on you've wore it the worth of the making and
now you're SO saucy about it, I'll never pay you
nohow."
One of her most delightful traits was her use
OF language She avaed herself of the most
difficult words with joyous abandon. Nothing
irritated her SO much not being able to COM
prehend what said. The governess Ger
man, was much out of her favor on this account.
Them fowlins and mamsis needn't talk to me-
| don't like broken languages" she would observe
Wrathfully All tongues save English I'M
der this comprehensive and contemptuous phrase
broken languages" English never presented the
slightest difficulty to her. l recollect her an
nounc1ng the census-taker "the sensitive man."
and on another occasion saying of couple of gen.
tleman visitors, There they goes, walking if
they owned the worl'! They walk like generals;
and II they was generals, they wouldn't be COM
mon generals; they'd be brggerty-generals!"
| am sorry to add to this that our beloved Cha
rybds had faiings-among them dishonesty, so
common fault with black servants that it is
taken almost a matter of course. Charybdis
stole adroitly, and was seldom caught in the act
When she was, her explanations were always
ready, though not always probable.
Il was ataking it into town to get it done UP
right clean You know you is mighty pertikeler
Whpn
detected with the backing-brush in her pocket
Rates system on these occasions was always the
same AS soon as any article missed she
would tell Charybdis that, being inanimate the
thing could not have walked off by ITSELF conse
quently she, Charybdis, must have taken it. "Mis-
laid, was the euphemism employed. Sometimes
this course was at successful; at other times
weeks would pass by while Charybds, who was
always taken lame while under suspicion limped
about the house, her face black with gloom and
looking like a brooding storm Suddenly the in
ward struggle coming to end, she would decide to
restore the treasure, and running up stairs with
light step and total absence of lameness would
produce it from some thrice-searched corner, with
g1ggle OF triumph and be happy and light-heart-
ed as forgiven child for days afterward Occa-
sonally the article would never return. In such
cases the gloom would gradually tighten, but the
JOY was wanting.
We had been months at Box Hl-summer had
given place to autumn, and autumn carried us al
most to the Christmas tide-when one cool even
ing, at hair-brushng time, Charybdis came into
our bedroom carrying the huge backlog with
which 1t was her nightly duty to replenish the
fire. Harriet was at the toilettetable and l. from
the chimney-corner, was lazily studying the curl
Gus markings and grainings on the pine walls and
celllng-a study which afforded me never-fang
delight. Here was dragon, there girls face,
as II the tree from which the plank had
photographed by some mysterious process the
events and people which had passed within its
ken during centuries of growth. ! was weaving a
Christmas story from the odd marks thwarted
vexatously, from the fact that the dragon would