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Weeks, months, sometimes, roll by before the wagon reaches its destination; but it reaches it at last. Then begin the struggle, and pains, the labors, and dangers of border life, in all of which woman bears her part. While the primeval forest falls before the stroke of the man-pioneer, his companion does the duty of both man and woman at home. The hearthstone is laid, and the rude cabin rises.
Neither is the rich smell of oaten or wheaten bread, which the good wife is baking on the griddle, unpleasant to your nostrils; nor would the bubbling of a large pot, in which you might see, should you chance to enter, a prodigious square of fat, yellow, and almost transparent bacon tumbling about, to be an unpleasant object; truly, as it hangs over a large fire, with well-swept hearthstone, it is in good keeping with the white settle and chairs, and the dresser with noggins, wooden trenchers, and pewter dishes, perfectly clean, and as well polished as a French courtier.
Miss Deeble marched her downstairs to an empty kitchen, and left her sitting on a stool in the middle of it with an A B C in her hand. But Beth took no interest in the alphabet in those days, and hunted black-beetles with the bellows instead of learning it. The hearthstone was the place of execution. When she found a beetle, she would blow him along to it with the bellows, and there despatch him.
I have secured a copy of the ballad referred to by our guide, which records the desolation of Derryveigh. All such actions are celebrated in local poetry; but this is one of the fiercest; you can publish it if you think best: "The cold snow rests on levelled walls, where was a happy home, The wintry sky looks down upon a desolate hearthstone.
At this period of General Grant's nomination, the nation's heart still jubilant with the success of the Federal arms; its conscience awakened by the dread penalty paid by contributions from every loyal hearthstone for the subjugation of slavery, was now eager and active in providing that the Negro who had been faithful in peace and heroic in war, should enjoy the rights of an American citizen.
"Ready!" rose in simultaneous response from below. "Then look out!" Reaching for the spring cleverly concealed in the wall at my right I vigorously pressed it. The result was instantaneous. Silently, but with unerring certainty, something small, round, and deadly, fell plumb from the library ceiling to where the settle had formerly stood against the hearthstone.
Then she turned to me and asked: "Has thou iver heerd tell o' ash-riddling?" "Of course I have," I replied. "Everybody knows what it is to riddle ashes." "Aye, but ash-riddling on the hearthstone, the neet afore St Mark's Day?" Here was something unfamiliar, and I readily confessed my ignorance.
You tould me, on Lunnon Bridge, that you knew THAT, at least," pointing to the abbey; "ay, and the quare ould hearthstone that's to be found in it. And so, look at this, uncle, honey." He vaulted upon his relative's horse.
"She has always a place in her heart, though, for absent dear ones, and she often thinks regretfully of one sweet face that used to smile at her hearthstone. "Can you not come to me, Clemence? "Last Sabbath I went to place my offering of flowers at the graves of our buried dead. The golden glory of the autumn day poured its heavenly radiance into the far depths of my soul.
"And when the MacGregors come down the glen, and ye see toom faulds, a bluidy hearthstone, and the fire flashing out between the rafters o' your house, ye may be thinking then, Ewan, that were your friend Rob to the fore, you would have had that safe which it will make your heart sair to lose." Ewan of Brigglands again shrugged and groaned, but remained silent.
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