The evening Caledonian. [volume] (St. Johnsbury, Vt.) 1918-1920, 1919-03-27

followed her on the keys. Sans chin !
sank lower and lower into his chest
there was no coughing, no rustling
OF programs. MibD cast a spell over
that throng and even the most soph- Il
1sticated for the moment could not
break away. And the spell was no
less thrown over the hearts and minds
of five ordinary country folk down in
the front seats of that theater.
Did we remember where we had
heard Mibb sing THAT song before?
All, yes, we did. No need to turn
to one another and ask it. The same
emotion was passing in the hearts of /
the five of u.s.
1t carried us back. to the night of
the little local talent play when we
| were all boys and girls and life was a
very different thing from that which
! it had turned out. 1t carried us back
to the young folk of those bygone
days, caustic-tongued Grace |
Rawlins, little George Griffin in his
voluminous white overalls struggling
and swearing to make the event a
success, Mrs. Christopher Stacy in
ner stage-fright, the little Hoadley
baby who would not suffer himself to
be produced in public as offspring
however Legitimate for the moment
But most of all, it carried US back
to the menfolk who were gone, :.
Jack and Herbert. It carried us
back to the dance afterward and the
carefree laughter on that Spring
night in the long ago, of happy boys
and girls, going home from a dance.
The song was most appropriate.
We were growing old indeed. Silver
, was beginning to show in our hair
and life was fading away. True it
was, also, that those to whom the
song might have referred, were ever
to be young and fair, young and fair
as we remembered them before we
lost them, ever the same faces in the
Imagery of memory. And there was
a sigh in our hearts at the moment
that amounted to sob.
: Oh the pathos of going down life's
pathway steadily day by day and re-
collecting the dew-damp, sun-warmed
5 mornings when we first began. the
journey with small thought of the
length of that Oddessy or the rough
: and rocky windings in the highway
: before it wound down for the final
turn into the peaceful shadows!
The cruel part of losing Eden is not
E the going from it. No, but in the
! curse of recollection that once there
was an Eden and we lived in it,
: though for only a little little while
Mibb did not wait for applause to
spoil the effect she had created. She
: passed quickly though equally quiet
, ly to "Home, Sweet Home
5 enid pleasures and palaces, where
'er we may roam,
Be it ever SO humble, there's no
y place like home.
d A charm from the skies seems to
r hallow US there
S Which sought through the world
g is not met with elsewhere.
: Home, home, sweet, sweet home
n be it ever so humble there's no place
t like home"
d Mary Purse put her handkerchief
e quickly to her lips. Then it went up
y to her eyes and she held it there.
Il Only two men in that audience
Il fancied they knew why Mibb put such
e feeling into her last song.
Is Somehow we wished we were al
e out of that place and up in the fam.
e liar old streets of aPris, Vermont!
Was the applause deafening? Il
n was!
They would not let Mibb go of
is that platform. They called for her a
gain and again. And again and a
# gain she had to respond. A bouque
of flowers came down the left aisle
II somewhere under the mass human
being carried along by legs. Another
came down the right aisle. Wave
g after wave of approval swept dow
n from the balconies and back again
ID "And to think" said Sam hoarsely
Sc "that THAT Queen of Sheba
Y. worked in our printing ofice!"
lie Sam wanted to go back-stage ane
lei see Mibb and visit with her but Alice
rs would not have it.