An Autumn Ramble in Washington Territory [pp. 41-45]

An Autumn Ramnble in Washington Territory.
and she flopped down in the bottom of the
wagon, and got up a respectable cry. Her
eyes grew becornin'ly red, and so did her
nose. By the time she got to our house, she
looked the afflicted widow, which was all she
pretended to be now.
"The next day was the funeral. Folks
gathered in'to look at the corpse and admire his new clothes'-so little Sherman said
-the little heathen!
"Those two boys, Sherman, fourteen years
old, and Grant, nine years old, made me so
ashamed! In the front yard their pa's hat
was stuck up for a target, an' them both
shootin' at it with bows an' arrows. They
agreed upon the division of the property:
Sherman took the boots and Grant the pocket knife.
"After all was quiet, the funeral over, an'
folks all gone, Mrs. Sloan, that's the widder,
hunted around and found all the milk, just
as the old man left it. Some of it stood on
shelves in the kitchen. She skimmed it,
and sold the butter he had churned. My
man will never eat a pound of store butter
since he knew of her sendin' that for sale!
" She has stayed on the place ever since.
I wish it wasn't so near. Just across the
lane, and our chickens mix. I can see an'
hear everything they do."
The doors were open, and I looked across
at the house, and saw Mrs. Sloan in the
yard, sleeves rolled up, one hand shading
her eyes.
"You Sherman and Grant, come here this
minnit. I just wish I hadforty like ye, an'
I'd have a shootin' match."
"There," said our gossipy Mrs. Gaines,
"you see how it is. She always has such a
time in finding her little boys. She says
they never come near to help about anything, but when it is meal time they are
always on- time.
"Law me, folks that don't train their children when they are small to mind and be
helpful, shouldn't except much from them;
nor they don't deserve any sympathy, either.
"There is our James: he never was quick
to work when he was small, and I never expected much from him. He would build
fires an' milk the cow, and do chores willin'
enough; but he never showed any love or
fancy for work. I mean, he never hunted
for it, or saw that it needed to be done.
"Now he's sixteen; he hates farm-work,
he says, an' no special talent for any other
occupation, professional or mechanical. I
feel sorry for him.
"I will have to tell his secret, but I
wouldn't have him know it. He saw a pictorial advertisement, describin' in such an allurin' way these'photograph cameras. They
seemed to sink deep down into his thoughts.
He believed he could buy one for a'most
nothin', start out takin' photographs for
people, and make an endless fortune right
off.
"He spent thousands of dollars in the
month he waited for his camera to come.
He built us a fine house and furnished it.
I had a girl to do the work, and an endless
lot of finery. He had a library stocked with
the books he could not get, but had wanted
so long. Then the books an' papers he
bought for the poor,children he knows! an'
he finished the church-house, an' carpeted it.
You know they have waited so long, expectin' to raise money by monthly subscriptions
to complete the buildin'. His imagination
was active and full of pleasure for a brief
time. At last the camera came!
"He was so excited he could hardly wait
to read the directions how to operate the instrument. He studied it, though, carefully,
till he knew just what to do.
"Then we had to give up one of the bedrooms to him. He covered up every crack
and knot-hole that let in sunshine; drove
the children out of there; fixed up a dark
lantern out of a cigar box; then came
out, adjusted his camera, and went to work.
"He pointed it at me when I was washin'
dishes, clapped on the cap over the tube,
run into hissdark room, holdin' his'slide' he
called it, shutthe door, an' all the children
thought he had gone crazy, he acted so queer
and awfully mysterious.
"He used up all his negative platesthere was only six of'em. Then he commenced developin' an' tonin.' Law me, you
[Jall.
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