FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   50   51   52   53   54   55   56   57   58   59   60   61   62   63   64   65   66   67   68   69   70   71   72   73   74  
75   76   77   78   79   80   81   82   83   84   85   86   87   88   89   90   91   92   93   94   95   96   97   98   99   >>   >|  
molasses for dinner, and there'll be some cold with milk for supper, and we shan't have any cooking to do at all." They went round to the kitchen door. Rachel stopped in the wood-shed, and the tears rushed to her eyes. "Dear father! How he has worked over that wood, early and late, to spare us!" We will not revive Dorothy's struggles with the farm-work and with the boys. They were an isolated family at the mill-house; their peculiar faith isolated them still more, and they were twelve miles from meeting and the settlement of Friends at Stony Valley. Dorothy's pride kept her silent about her needs, lest they might bring reproach upon her father among the neighbors, who would not be likely to feel the urgency of his spiritual summons. The summer heats came on apace and the nights grew shorter. It seemed to Dorothy that she had hardly stretched out her tired young body and forgotten her cares in the low attic bedroom, before the east was streaked with light and the birds were singing in the apple-trees, whose falling blossoms drifted in at the window. One day in early June, Friend Barton's flock of sheep--consisting of nine experienced ewes, six yearlings, and a sprinkling of close-curled lambs whose legs had not yet come into mature relations with their bodies--were gathered in a little railed inclosure, beside the stream which flowed into the "mill head." It was supplied by the waste from the pond, and when the gate was shut, rambled easily over the gray slate pebbles, with here and there a fall, just forcible enough to serve as a douche bath for a well-grown sheep. The victims were panting in their heavy fleeces, and their hoarse, plaintive tremolo mingled with the ripple of the water and the sound of young voices in a frolic. Dorothy had divided her forces for the washing to the best advantage. The two elder boys stood in the stream to receive the sheep, which she, with the help of little Jimmy, caught and dragged to the bank. The boys were at work now upon an elderly ewe, while Dorothy stood on the brink of the stream, braced against an ash sapling, dragging at the fleece of a beautiful but reluctant yearling. Her bare feet were incased in a pair of moccasins which laced around the ankle; her petticoats were kilted, and her broad hat bound down with a ribbon; one sleeve was rolled up, the other had been sacrificed in a scuffle in the sheep-pen. The new candidate for immersion stood bleating and trembling
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   50   51   52   53   54   55   56   57   58   59   60   61   62   63   64   65   66   67   68   69   70   71   72   73   74  
75   76   77   78   79   80   81   82   83   84   85   86   87   88   89   90   91   92   93   94   95   96   97   98   99   >>   >|  



Top keywords:

Dorothy

 

stream

 
father
 
isolated
 
douche
 

tremolo

 

plaintive

 

mingled

 

ripple

 

curled


hoarse

 

fleeces

 

victims

 

panting

 

mature

 
gathered
 

supplied

 
easily
 

rambled

 
pebbles

railed

 

forcible

 
bodies
 

inclosure

 

flowed

 

relations

 

caught

 

kilted

 

petticoats

 

incased


moccasins

 
ribbon
 

candidate

 

immersion

 

trembling

 

bleating

 

scuffle

 

sacrificed

 

rolled

 

sleeve


yearling

 

receive

 

dragged

 

advantage

 

frolic

 

voices

 
divided
 
forces
 
washing
 

dragging