Rensselaer Union, Volume 8, Number 11, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 2 December 1875 — A Washington Character. [ARTICLE]

A Washington Character.

A Washington correspondent of th® Cincinnati Gasetts writes: “A few dan ago there atepped briakly into the library of one of tlie Government buildings a hard-featured woman, whose age might range anywhere between sixty and seventy. Her face looked like a P in ®. knot, so weather-beaten and tough and bronzed was it, but it wore sueh an appearance of frank, hearty good humor, lighted by shrewd intelligence, that I could not fail to observe and be interested inker. Her black dress was short and old-fashioned in its cut, its only trimming being a feeble attempt at a narrow, scant ruffle round the bottom. Over this was a white muslin overdress, spotlessly white, but very full and totally unlooped. Evidently the ha'dy-looking feminine had no sympathy with tlie ‘ pull-backs’ of the period. On her head was a queer bonnet, whose shape and trimmings no sacrilegious hand had touched, ‘upon altering thoughts intent,’ for jpany years. The little woman, standing erectly up, asked in a brisk tone for Hugh Miller! I gazed at her in perplexed surprise. Was she asking for herself, or was she sent by some one for the book mentioned ?' After she made her exit I turned to the librarian and remarked that the woman just departed struck me as beinjj something of a character. * Indeed she is,’ was the reply, ‘ a remarkable character with a very romantic history.’ Anything tinged with romance always held mj' interest enchained, so I prepared myself for a treat while listening to the recital of this woman’s life and career. She was a Scotch woman by birth, and while a bonnie Highland lassie married a brave and intelligent young soldier in the English army. His fate she has followed for nearly half a century, going to Egypt, to Constantinople, to France, to Africa, and finally to America, where her husband, obtaining an honorable discharge from the English army, enlisted under Gen. Scott, and helped to fight our Mexican battles. During this campaign she was almost the only woman in the army, saving Mrs.’’Gen. Hunter, theu the wife of a subordinate officer. In our civil war her husband lost his eyesight through the effects of some concussion, and his devoted companion spent all of her leisure time and spare money in purchasing books to read to her afflicted husband. She was company laundress, and with the means thus obtained, coupled with her husband’s pension, and demonstrating the extent ot Scotch thriftjness, she provided for her husband’s mental and physical wants with unflagging zeal and devotion. After awhile some celebrated oculist partly restored the soldier’s eyesight. The Government gave the woman a menial position and the man something to db as messenger, and they still continue to devour the best books iu the library, always asking for standard or philosophical works, and in their neat and humble home they together read and discuss tlie thoughts of the great writers.”