Rensselaer Union, Volume 6, Number 47, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 13 August 1874 — My Landlady. [ARTICLE]

My Landlady.

I board now, and I think I have one of the kindest landladies in the world. She seems to think iqgreat deal of me, and I sometimes ahnost decided that I should weep if any harm came to her. She is very particular about her boarders. Before she would take me in I was compelled to get a certificate from three clergymen, two bankers, and a lawyer, stating that I had never been hung for murder or sent to State prison for horsestealing. I bargained for a front room lookingout on the campus martius, and it was understood that 1 was to have the room alone. On the third night-I went home and found a stranger in bed, and when I began to raise a row Mrs. Dolby caught my arm and whispered: “ There, now, be a good, dear man, and say no more. He’s a preacher, and, as he is going away to-morrow, I thought you wouldn’t mind just one night.” At the end of the week she. beckoned me aside, and smiling like a load of fresh hay she wanted to know if I would do her a favor —a favor which would place her under eternal obligations to me. I replied that I would die for her, and then she asked me to give up the room lookingout upon the grand square and take one look ing out upon a grand alley, full of ash barrels and oyster cans. Bhc had a new boarder coming who was awful particular, and she knew I would do anything to accommodate her. I made the change, and the grateful look she gave me was enough to melt a vest button. I had only got fairly settled when I was told that she wanted to seiT me in the parlor after dinner. I found her in tears. She* said that a Very nice man and his very nice wife wanted to come and board with her, but she had no room, and it grieved her to think that she must lum-thenr away when she was so hard pushed to get along. I told her that if I had a hundred lives I would lay them all down for her and then borrow a hundred more and add to the pile, and she seized my hand and said that Heaven would surely reward hie for being good to a fatherless orphan. I moved into the garret, the awful particular man moved into my room, 4ih<l the very nice man and his very nice wife moved into the front room. In about another week Mrs. Dolby whispered to ’me and wanted to know if I had a snake in my stomach? She said that she had observed that I was a -very hearty eater, and she didn’t know but I had a snake. I set her right, and"when I promised to take full lunches down town and urge the other boarders to do the same she put her hand on my shoulder and remarked that Heaven had a place for me. - - Tliat night my bed was made without sheets, and when I w r ent to raise a row -she-tpok-roe by the hand and said thiiU her experience went to show that it was healthier to sleep w ithout sheets. I wuis going to argue the question, when tears came to her eyes and she hoped I wouldn’t say anything to hurt a poor, lone widow whose life had been one long struggle with poverty. The next night, the feather bed and one of the pillows went, but I didn’t say anything. Then she wanted to borrow my tooth-brush lor a bqarder who hadn’t any, and she took my stove to Use in the low’er hall. I didn’t say a 'U-qrd until she wanted to know if I couldn’t spare the old rag-car-pet off the floor, and if I wouldn’t set the other boarders an example by drinking nothing but water and not taking a second biscuit. Then I told her that I Was going to leave that house and try to tear her image from my heart. She seized both my hands, tears rolled down her cheeks, and she asked: “ Mister Quad, will you deliberately plot to kill a lonesome widow who is working her life out to make your position here comfortable, happy and luxurious?”

I couldn’t go, I’m there yet. I sleep on the floor, rut up with cold bites, and use the. boot-jack for a chair when I have company. I wish I Wasn’t so tenderhearted, but I can’t' bear to think of hurting Mrs. Dolby’s feelings by looking up another place.— ls. Quad, in Our Fireside Friend. —Oh! the skeeter, the beautiful skeeJer, filling the air with beaiitiful meter. Under our hat and tickling our. nose, taking a bite throiigh a hole in our clotpes; in through the window; openiiig the door; filling our chamber, and singing the sweeter, ever is found the untir-' ing muskeeter. ' '

—You can lie by lifting up your eyebrows; you ran lie by a nod; you cpn lieby silence. In other words the intentional producing on another person’s mind au impression not in accordance with the truth is what I understand by not being truthful. The voluntary producing on another man’s mind an iin. pression that is true is what-I understand by being absolute truthful. —Cor. Christian Union.