The Birmingham age-herald. [volume] (Birmingham, Ala.) 1902-1950, 1909-12-05

way tIle Wofiu. Du. Lcr home
is also the home OF her sisters, each OF
whom works hard to contribute her snare,
and the atmosphere of love and loyalty,
sunshine and open-hearted comradeshp
that overflows the whole brave littlo
household is beautiful thing to see.
Pioneer Tales.
Mr.. Brown is much respected among
persuade him to tell at their reunions
tales of the primitive days of Kansas and
the west that stir their blood and their
memories. His life, from boyhood up, has
been filled with adventure. Like all the
Browns. he is gifted with strong sense
of humor, and with great and fearless
originality of thought and diction and he
is inspired with that rare genius-a
knowledge and unfaling selection of the
pertinent and of the true From him. as
from all his kin, you may look for the
clean-cut fact In clean-cut words that de-
scribe 1t, though the heavens fall; and to
him you must be drawn, by the power OF
hearty, sunny, honest humanity.
or a temperament entirely different
from his brother Johns, Salmon Brown,
then a powerful, high-spirited lad In ms
teens who had long been chatting at the
patient endurance of the Free State men.
welcomed the chance to ''let little blood
on the other sde,""sswllen the gantlet was
down in Kansas. From the day in May,
1856, when he dropped his spade IN the
field to march to the relief of threatened
Lawrence to the moment, that Following
summer, when a tearing rifle wound de-
prived him of the use of an arm. ne
fought. straight through, with gayety and
in, of the game.
Mr.. Browns memory, like his elder
brothers, is of extraordinary power Both
recall In detail the circumstances ana Sc
ouence of the events of their long years
and a careful comparison of their state
ments with authenticated facts only ADDS
to the marvel of their accuracy Both
men, moreover, possess the rare 1acuity
of knowing the boundaries of their recol-
lections with neither Is there any spec
ulative, halfway ground; they know, or
they have forgotten; and they rarely for
get.
His Daughter Annie.
Up in the remotest hills of California
around the shoulder Of Cape Mendocino'
in tiny cottage in an eyrie as mac
cessible as 1t is superb, lives John
Browns daughter Annie. His confdante.
his watch dog" it was often on her wit
and unsleeping vigilance that his safety
and that Of his men depended. OF the
little company that for so many weeks
lay hidden in the farmhouse on the Mary
land heights. awaiting the moment
when they should strike their desperate
blow for freedom-when they should, in
striking at the arsenal at Harpers Ferry,
dare the whole force of the United States,
Annie Brown, now Annie Brown Adams,
alone survives.
Her "reminiscences of those thrilling
days, of the little band who, for the most
part knowing that they should perish,
gave all for the shake of conscience and
of the oppressed, are of vital interest. A
keen critic of human nature. Mrs. Adams
characterization of the young men who
followed her father to their doom are
vivid as life To hear her describe the
DAYS at Kennedy Farm, or those earlier
years at North E,lba, when fathers
plan was at once the dread secret and
the handspring of every act of that de-
voted, self-sacrihcing family, is to sec
the scene before ones eyes. Like the
other Browns, Mrs. Adams thinks so keen
Nv that she is incapable of expressing
herself in commonplace words; her talk,
like theirs, has the clarity and the wit
of a classic.
Mr., Adams. very considerably his Wife
senior, and one son constitute the fam
lily in the little house in the forest. Mrs.
Adams, single-handed, does all the sim
pie household work, and when 1t Is done
will often mount a horse and go Off for a
solitary ride in the glorious mountain
air. through country so beautiful as fair
ly to seem unreal. The Browns were
ever pioneers and lovers of nature I'M
disturbed, but this one has exceeded them
ALL and certainly has found at once the
farthest and the finest refuge that the
A.1e