The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1915-04-20

She asked why we didn't have
more books in the honset'
should be one of the family and not
| of the family. There was disap-
pointment on the side of the parents
there was a strangeness on her side
| Ma, the Lord sent that girl to the
wrong house.'' said the father at
| last.
I've sometimes thought So" was
And SO has she, but nobody's to
blame as 1 can see. She's here, and
she's sorter useless, but We've got to
bear the burden the Lord puts upon
u.s.
At fourteen Ruth was sent to the
village school. After two years she
was sent away to a boarding school
their minds about being "sorter use
less" but, as Farmer Streeter had OBJ
served as he sat before the fire one
evening; Ma, I'm not complainin
about Ruth any more"
No, you amt, pa"
''I said once that the Lord brought
her here
yes
Well, I'm leavin' it to Him to
bring it around as He thinks best. I
patchin, maxim bread and cuttin'
carpet rags, but as she didn't, mebbe
she was sorter told to go the other
on?''
II amt asked her many questions
and she amt told me much, but Par
son Davis told me the other day that
he heard she was one of the SmarteSt
girl in school. She'll be finished up
this fall, you know.
And then come back to us?"
Yes
and then-then-" he queried aft
81 dunno, JOSIAH dunno!''
They had Il world circumscribed by
the farm limits. They knew what
went on in their world, but not in the
other. 1t was work, work in their
year, and particular work for each
season. They awoke at just such an
hour; they went to bed at just such
an hour. Their meals seldom varied.
They plowed and dragged and sowed
and planted. They gathered the
crops. The farmer gave exhibitions
of his strength and boosted of his
health, and his wife boosted of the
of picked peaches she had put by.
Work, work, work and never rec
reation! They judged no one by their
talk or intelligence, but it was al
why, that fellow wouldn't be
worth his salt in the harvest field"
One day the farmer came home
from town with stranger in the
His name is. Durand," he ex-
planned to his wife, land he says he
paints pictures. He wants board and
lodging for the winter that he may
he will pay our price and give little
He'll turn up his nose at corned
beef and salt pork, won't he?"
IF he does he'll have to go. He
looks kinder pale and sickly, and I
don't believe he can throw a cat over
the fence, but We'll let him come if
you say SOL
Miss Ruth returned home she found
Mr.. Charles Durand, artist. from the
city, duly installed and at work on a
sketch of late autumn.
IT wouldn't give him his board for
what corn he could husk," whispered
the father that evening.
Why he don't know enough to
put collar on horse" added the
mother. II s9f
1t was a week OF more after her re-
turn home that Miss Ruth told her
parents that she had; heard of Mr.. |
Durand, and that some of his paint |
their farm, and that she had made
fair Roadway as an amateur artist and
wished to take lessons of him.
The father groaned and the mother
sighed. u
Father said the girl, "you have
owned this farm for twenty years.
You have worked like two oxen-you
and mother. How much better off are
you tnan Wnen you began =!
Two thousand dollars" he proud |
y replied.
You have worked with your mus
lie, father, and you have made hun
1red dollars year. A young man
will go through college in three years,
md then by use of his brains make
rom three to five thousand a year
GU have contempt for the man who
amt lift a barrel of cider, and yet he
nay make more money in a week
han you have in year. DR.. Grey can
lot lift a hundred pounds, but when
your hired man broke his leg the doc
Or'S bill was $40"
Neither father nor mother had a
word to say and the girl continued:
You have been disappointed in me
because I am not big, strong, husky
sirl and don't take to homework. 1t
ook me less than a fortnight to make
ome sketches over at Brownsville that
sold for one hundred dollars
GOSH exclaimed the father.
There isn't a lawyer in the state
eet, and yet the poorest one of them
makes ten times the money you do.
You have thought me helpless and
Useless. You have thought all people
o not made of IRON
YES" admitted the father, "sorter
Useless, and now I can realize that me
nd your ma have been sorter fools
IL the time
When a fine landscape is signed
Durand' it isn't always the work of
reation of his wife, Mrs. Durand, for
nerly Ruth Streeter
And father and mother DON'T have
o work any more.-(Copyright, 1915,
y the Mcclure Newspaper Syndicate.) ,
|. |. IN HANDS