News and citizen. [volume] (Morrisville, Vt. ;) 1881-current, 1914-03-25
BY FIRESIDE AND WAYSIDE
On the Mantel Piece
JOHN ELLIOT BOWMAN

JOHN ELLIOT BOWMAN
In the life of the unknown millions III
mantel piece is one of the tests whereof
the owner may be known as truly as b.
the pictures on his wall. 1t was an oh
ject of pride and adornment long befor'
the days of the inn at Sweet Aubur,
where
'The broken teacups wisely kept for show
Along the chimney glistened in row."
Some of the old-time mantel piecel
have been preserved for us in fiction o.
in the references contained in old diaries
The shelf held Undertook, fints, shutters
candlesticks, and occasionally in the Older
settlements, an Indian Ratchet; for the
red man was already 40 far in the past to
residents of those localities that some
thing of sentimental interest was attached
to his memory by the descendants of
those who had driven him away. A row
of seed-corn hung against the chimney
above the shelf. The autumn fields of
Kansas and Nebraska are rich with grain
to- day because it hung there. To how
macy warm fire-lighted chimney corners
Of the mind have been preserved in the
days th.t we call provincial, The seeds of
our be-, mental life.
At either side of the chimney, beneath
the mantel shelf were the bellows and
Poor Richards Almanac. The latter is
legibe to day although it's pages were
frayed by the farmers fingers; and have
that they have lain in the forgotten attic
exposed to mice and mildew. Thepages
for March contain many a hopeful entry
concerning the Inauguration OF the process
of incubation; "Set old Specke on four
teen eggs" How many of them Matched?
The records of some hens are given, |
others remain unchronicled. Probably |
on the average these homely enterprises |
were as fortunate in results as were many |
human schemes when SUBJ
jected to similar process. Perhaps the
farmers plans encountered no greater pro-
portion of disappontments than those of
statesmen and politicians with whose
projects his were contemporaneous.
Here, among a later pile of almanacs
rom the kitchen mantel-piece is the Old
Farmers for 1912. Surely no nest Ell
,irely void of chickens after three anx-
GUS weeks classes with the loss sustained
oy Napoleon watching from the Kremlin
not Onlv the dasrruction nf his 90 nit n hut |
The dissipation into air of all the plans he
lad 80 carefully built. 1t was not CITY,
)ut world-empire that crumbled in those
lanes. AS long ago as the year when this
lad long been in favor as mantel orna-
nent. Perhaps it must be- regarded
with the eyes of sentiment If its place Is
10 be justified to-day. SO viewed or not,
surely prefer it to the plaster Venus or
he highly colored art photograph.
To the grandmother who first placed
t on her shelf it spoke of Cousin Abner
If whose long voyages it testified II
worst enemy was his weakness aga n,I
When asked why be, a ma
i've OF an inland town took long sea voy-
Iges. his reply, often gu by hls az
lualntances, was the simple answer: ITO
yet away from Abner." The discipline
IN shipboard. even with the temptations
hat lay in foreign ports, made the sea
ess dangerous to him than was the free
iom of the home farm with the tavern
ust below at The Four Corners. His last
,oyage was made nearly century ago
md his grave has been for nearly as long
J time by the shores of Assowicket, whose
waves in spring or autumn gale suggest
hose of the sea. Looking out upon the
AXE one hopes that in that voyage
whence there is no return, he got away
rom Abner."
The shells spoke to the sailors cousin
# the one who had brought them home,
md they were thus perhaps link with
Ter family which upheld her courage
lnder adverse conditions. Hel young
married life fell upon the days when cot
on mills were first being built in Mas
achusetts. Her husband had served as
brennan in the first Of these mills while
till retaining his home on small farm
lear his fathers, where he was a neigl
'or TO his wife's people. The father mi
rated to the far west, Cayuga C"unry,
Jew York, and the son, on the return
rom the horseback journey that lay b.