Year: 1878

When the widow Coe married Jason
Carter she brought him no money at
all; only small, stony farm in Noppit,
that had been her fathers and two wild
boys of ten and twelve years growth.
Jack and Dan were hard subjects for a
step-father to rule, and Jason Carter
found his hands full. Naturally he was
a quiet, gentle, but persistent man; in
his youth he had run away to sea, and
for fifteen years had been a common
sailor, which had pretty well knocked
the quiet out of and the persistence into
him. In this time he had learned to
swear, as matter of course, though he
had been strictly brought up, and went
to church and Sunday school always.
His mother would have cried her eyes
out to hear him talk in this fashion, but
she never did; his father would have
used the rod, but he also was spared the
trouble, for both father and mother had
died before Jason came back, and when
he found they were gone he never went
back to Tolland, but after he got tired
of sea- going took to peddliug notions
about the country, and at last married
the widow Coe and settled down in Mop
pit.


He had stopped swearing long ago;
for under dear old Father Taylor
preaching he had been converted be-
tween his last two voyages, and though
profanity had become habit with him,
he had conquered it at last, after years
Of patient endeavor, and now was Sc
gentle, and pleasant, and pious, that
Phoebe Coe thought her last days would
be her best days.


He had come to know the widow Co,
from being an old shipmate of her broth
er, John Wires; who had also left sea-
faring because he had injured knee,
and because too lame to climb rigging;
so he ct up small shop in Boston,
where he sold tobacco, twine, and other
odds and ends; but he had been mar
ried and had one son, called Jenison.
This boy was about the age of widow
Goes youngest son, for her brother had
married soon after she did, while he was
still sailor; and when Jason Garter be-
gan the peddling business, John Wires
had told him to stop when he went
through Scranton and see his sister.
The children were small, and their faith
er living, when Jason first saw them,
and they learned to look for "Uncle
Jase" every spring and fall with delight,
for he always brought them marbles,
tops, candy, string, and made them
bows and kites, sure passports to boys
heart. So when their poor drunken
father died and the widow found herself
left without penny, she moved over
to Noppit to live with her father, and
when he died, too, leaving her all he
had, the farm from which he had
scratched scanty living, and she found
herself alone and helpless, she. listened
favorably to Jason Carter's proposal, for
he was tired of his wandering life as she
of her loneliness, and married him. The
boys were glad, for they loved him, and
they never had loved their own father,
and Jason was as good to them as if they
were his own, though certain thrill Of
emotion shook him when his baby
daughter came, that never had troubled
that worn old heart in any emergency of
Jack or Dan. But then Celia was girl;
of course that made it Different Jason,
when compared with his predecessor,
was as mild and pleasant about the
house as spring day after stormy win
ter. He became useful and prominent
member in the Noppit church, and new
er was heard to utter a profane or i'm
patient word. Jack and Dan loved him
as much as healthy boys love anything
but mischief and meals, and Phoebe was
entirely happy. 81


True, they we're poor; Jason had a
few hundred dollars laid by, but the
Noppit farm was too sterile to produce
crops enough to support the family, SO
he laid out his little capital, or part of
L, in good breed of sheep, which found
abundant living among mullens, hard
hack and huckleberry bushes, and prov