Year: 1872



 obscure, belonged to soscommUnana poor class, that no notice of her death found place in even the cheapest paper, and no one who knew her will read these words. Only one of those thousands of ordinary lives that, day by day, end unnoticed, no more missed by the world than so many burned-out candles. This woman had neither beauty, nor wit, nor large culture; she brought no gift with her when she was born to make her greatly welcome to the I world never could singsa song, nor write ! poem; was not even fitted to reign in a drawing-room. She was only a sweet voiced, gentle lady, full of womanly aftec- tion and eager tenderness, who had kept her pure childish beliefs unchanged to middle age. She was little, sickly, shab- billy clothed; she lived in q tawdry house with glaring paper on the walls, and torn, dirty mating on the hoor the air she breathed was that of want and vulgarity; year in and year out she worked at ma chine, sewing dresses for servants and

 shop-girls who bullied her, not unreason- ably, for she was but poor sempstress, if the truth must be told Her husband, 0 coarse grained, gossiping fellow, tried this trade and that, became ward politi- clan, did what he could for his family, but felt that his wife must do her share. He had been used to raw-boned, stout Con- ! necticut farm women, beside whom she doubtless appeared inefficient enough.

 If others remembered how tenderly nur. tured she had been as girl, and that the

 fortune she brought him he had flung

 away, he never did. Nor did she. They

 were wretchedly poor, and it was but just

 and proper she should work. So she work | ed, stopping now and then to give birth

 to another child, to be nursed at the tired breast, and watched and prayed over with l the blind, idolatrous devotion she gave to the others. Certain logical moralsts Icy down as axioms that there can be no trag- edy without crime, and that no woman,

 with love, a husband and children, ought

 to ask for more. This woman never did

 ask for more. The loud bragging politi-

 clan remained her hero to the last. If her

 life slowly dried and withered away, as

 tree might, tapped of all it's juices at the

 to blame. This poor lady was cursed with

 as finely wrought an organization as any favorite of fortune both body and mind

 required companions of her own caste,

 and that nutriment which Nature and Art give but to few, but which that few must | have or die. Besides, not even the strong est woman can furnish bread and but ter for 8 housefun of children, make their clothes, keep their souls pure and their manners refined, and add to the num- Der every year. She was not strong in any ! sense so she stitched, and nursed and

 trained them, with the dirty walls about her and the torn mating under foot, and the crowd of children grew shabbier and coarser and more vulgar day by day. One

 day an old accomplishment of her girl | hood recurred to her: fower-painting,

 molding in clay, designing it does not

 matter what; work, however, in which her

 real nature would have found food and

 expression, and the pay for which would have been comparative affluence. She sent

 specimen of her work for trial, which

 was approved; but-men were employed

 who had been trained to business. Only

 the machine was left, and the work for her | chlldrens bodies and souls that she could

 not do. It grew and grew before her sight

 Sntl the day came when she dropped as under an intolerable burden As she lay l on the bed day after day slowly dying, husband and children were loud in sor- row and astonishment. "How had she come by such manifold diseases? Machine work and want of air '? It was incredible She struggled with her work yet, sewed as she lay on her back, drew her children close to her with hungry unsatisfed love ! in her eyes that they could not understand. But as the the hour came for her to quit the world that had been so niggardly of ! It's comfort or bounty to her, she was be- set with restless fancies, which to her hus- band seemed scarcely sane. 'She thinks If she could see and smell 0 thorny rose that used to grow wild about the farms down there in Maryland where sine was

 born, she would be we'll again. Now what good could there be in rose ?' He could

 not see why she would make them put the children out of the room, and turn out the gas that she could not see the ma

 chine, and so lie looking up at the patch of sky above the brick walls When she ! was dead, he cried, '1 did what I could ::

 I am not to blame." And it was true no man can go beyond his nature. m a} B What was to blame? Not poverty; not the working for bread and butter not the

 unequal marriage. Since the world began

 King Cophetuas have married beggar girls

 untitled, and clothed them royalty in their l own flames; and Titanias have rejoiced to

 worship an ass. But if she had been taught

 practically the one occupation for which

 her taste and ability fitted her? If all

 women were 50 thoroughly taught such

 occupations that employment would be open to them as men? The answer mat .ters nothing to her now. 4 day or two

 ago the worn-out body was laid back ill

 the earth to which it had been drawn by

 such strong and subtle kinship. To what

 rest or recompense the soul of the gentle

 lady passed, only He knows who took it

 hence. Her work remains unfinished.

 But 1t IS because there are so many thou.

 sands of over-worked women around ua on every side, staring blankly at their un-

 conquerable work, and lives wasted at

 noon-day, that we have told her story, and

 reverently held back her memory, for this

 brief moment, out of the eternal silence.

 ''You have lost your baby, hear, said

 one gentleman to another. 'sYes, poor little thing it was only five months old.

 We did all we could for it. We had four

 doctors, blistered it's head and feet, put

 mustard poultices all over it, gave it nine calomel powders, leached it temples had

 it bled, gave it all kinds of medicines anu

 yet after 8 weeks illness it died. 1 It is getting to be an open uuestio.k

 whether Columbus travelled the most be- fore he died or since. He was first buried

 at the convent of St. Francis: then his

 body was remhved to the monastery of Las Cuevas; in 1886 it was removed across the Atlantic to San Domingo; in 1793 it

 was removed to the Havana Cathedral.

 and now the news comes that the body is

 again to be removed and used to start a

 new cemetery in Havana. l.a1 r 1 A Springfield clergyman began to mar " the groomsman and bridesmaid of A wedding party in that city, few evenings

 since, and had nearly completed the job

 before the groomsman mustered courage enough to object. The mortified minister

 then proceeded to join the right parties

 l The editor of the Chicago Post tells

 this: "What would you do if mamma

 should die2" asked . lady, with whom .vs