Rensselaer Republican, Volume 16, Number 32, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 17 April 1884 — A Rural Idyl. [ARTICLE]

A Rural Idyl.

Farmer Grind drew a long deep sigh and stood it up against a slanting sunbeam which came into the barn through a crack in the big door where he was at work. It was just as well to preserve if, for sighs were not as fresh and bright with him as they used to be in days before he had the asthma, so he thought it best to lay it by for future use; in fact, Farmer Grind laid everything by for future use that he could. It was really sad to see this whitehaired old man, this weather-beaten green stump of the forest, bowed down with grief, and the pitiful tears came into lus eyes and ttickled down tv the end of his nose, from which he evexland anon wiped them with the back of his gnarled and brawny hand. “You seem under the influence of a heavy sorrow, Brother Grind,” remarked the young parson, who had entered'unperceived, and seated himself on an upturned horse bucket, while the farmer was stuffing another bunch of straw into the cutter. The farmer looked up from his work with a weary smile of recognition and replied, after he had changed his quid to the other cheek: "Yes, brother, the hand of misfortune has rested heavily upon me. I try to bear it like a Christian, but it’s mighty hard pa’son and it goes powerful agin the grain to be resigned.” “I hope so, my afflicted brother, and trust that I may offer the consolations of religion,” said the parson, sympathetically; “but in what way have you been bereaved ? I hope your wife ——” “Oh, Betsy, she’s all right,” interrupted the farmer.— “And the children; I had not heard? You have not lost any of the children ?” and the parson grew more animated in his interest. “Not as I knows of,” said the farmer, “not a blamed kid; the children are doit g well enough.” “Where, then, has the blow fallen, brother? At what sacred place in the the family circle ha.? the dread shaft of the death angel been turned to bring sadness into, a once happy hbme ( ? The wind, I trust, will be tempered to the shorn lamb.” “The family circle is all serene, pa’son, but as for misfortune, I should rather think I’ve had my share since I saw you. You know that colt—that or’nary plug that uster run in the calflot thar? Well, sir, last spring I—I—” At this point the old man completely broke down, sobbed audibly, and gritted his teeth. “I sold him to Gabe Cummings for S3O and an old hair bridle. “Seems to me that was a fair price,” said the parson. “Seemed to me, at the time, that it war, but this is a weary world, pa’son, and we never know what trials is in ctore fur us. I know, pa’son, you’ll pardon my emotion when I tell you the news that I heerd only this morning. What do you think, but that thar dodblamed fool colt, that I sold for S3O and an old hair bridle, made a mile last Monday in 2:20, and beat Silverton Maid on a SSOO bet, and Gabe Cummings raked in all that wealth. There isn’t much temperin’ of the shorn lamb to the wind in that. I’m the worst shorn lamb you ever see, pa’son, and I" tell you this seems to me a mighty cold day fur lambs. ” Under the shadow of his great misfortune the old man bowed his hoary head over the straw-cutter, and dropped a tear and a large gob of grief into its depths. Some sorrows are too holy to be gazed on by strange eyes. The parson felt that even the consolations of religion would be inadequate in this case, and he tiptoed out of the barn and left the old man with his heart sorrow. — Texas Siftings.