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Show 196 UNCLE TOM'S CADI~: OR, By her side sat a woman with a bright tin pan in her lap, into which she was carefully sorting some Uricd peaches. She might be fifty-five or sixty; but hers wus one of those faces that time seems to touch only to brighten and adorn. Tho snowy lisso crapo cap, made after tho strait Quaker pattern, -the plain white muslin handkerchief, lying in placid folds across her bosom,-tbe drab shawl and dress,-showed at once the community to which she belonged. Her face y;as round and rosy, with a healthful downy softness, suggestive of a ripe peach. Her hair, partially silvered by age, was parted smoothly back from a high placid forehead, on which time had ·written no inscription, except peace on earth, good will to men, and beneath shone a large pair of clear: honest, loving brown eyes; you only needed to look straight into them, to feel that you saw to the bottom of a heart as good and true as ever throbbed in woman's bosom. So much has been said and sung of beautiful young girls, why don' t somebody wake up to the beauty of old women? If any want to get up an inspiration under this head, we refer them to our good . friend Rachel Halliday, just as she sits there in her little rocking-chair. It had a turn for quacking and squeaking,that chair had,-either from h;~ving taken cold in early life, or from some asthmn.tic affection, or perhaps from neryous derangement; but, as she gently swung backward and forward, the chair kept up a kind of subdued Hcrcechy crawcby," that would have been intolerable in any other chair. But old Simeon Ilallid~ty often declared it was as good as any music to him, and the children all avowed that they wouldn't miss of hearing mother's chair for anything in the world. For why 1 for twenty years or more, nothing but loving words, ami gentle moralities, and motherly loving kindness, had como from that chair ; - head-aches and heart-aches innurnemblc LIFE Ai\IONG TilE I.OWLY. 107 l1ad been cured there,- difficulties spiritual and temporal solved there,-all by one good, loving woman, God bless her! " And so thee still thinks of going to Canada, Eliza?" sho saitl, as she was quietly looking over her pea,.ches. 11 Yes, ma'am," said Eliza, firmly. '' I must go onward. I d:ne not stop." "And what 'II thee do, when thee gets there? ']'bee must think about that, my dn.ughter." "l\Iy daughter" came naturally from the lips of Rachel Halliday; for hers was just the face and form that made "mother'' seem the most natural word in the world. Eliza's hands trcmblcd1 and some tears fell on her fino work; but she answcrct11 firmly1 " I shall do-anything I ean find. I hope I can find something.'' " Thee knows thee can stay here, as long a.os thee pleases," said Rachel. "0, thank you," sa.id Eliza, "but n-she point-ed to Harry- " I can't sleep nights; I can't rest. L:1st night I dreamed I saw that man coming into the yard," she saiJ, shuddering. " Poor clJiiJ ! n said Rachel, wiping her eyes; "but thee mustn't feel so. The Lord hath ordered it so that never hath :~ fngitiyc been stolen from our vilhge. I trust thine wi1l not be the first." ~,he door here opened, and a little short, round, pincushiony woman stood at the door, with a cheery, blooming face, like a 1·ipe apple. She was dressed, like Rachel, in sober gray, with tho muslin fold.cd neatly across her round, plump little chest. "Ruth Stedman," said Rachel, cowing joyfully forward; 17* |