Rensselaer Union, Volume 10, Number 10, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 22 November 1877 — REGETTA’S THANKSGIVING. [ARTICLE]

REGETTA’S THANKSGIVING.

“I wish there wasn’t any Thankgiving Day; I just do.” • ... “Why do you wish that, Regotta?” “Just because I do; raisins to pick, and things to chop and to cut, and such a time with cooking!” “Is that allP” Dotty stopped slicing citron for a moment, and stood looking off through the window toward the gray clouds and the shivering trees, but was not thinking of either of them. “All? Deary me! that’s enough. Pies and cakes and all sorts of things to help make, and baking and boiling to do; and, as to the thanking partTl do not see much to thank for!—always stewing at a cook-stove, or cleaning up the room. Christmas is different from Thanksgiving, for people get presents after the cooking is over; hut Thanksgiving—some people might like it who nad something to be thankful for, but I”—and she tossed her brown hair on one side, and threw the raisins she had been picking, with a jerk, into the bowl waiting to receive them, and also over the table and the floor; for what could be expected but that the raisins would fly about when they were being tossed in such a fashion? ”Did you ever see the like of It? 51 Regetta commenced again. -“Even the raisins try to torment me; I would like to know what I have to thank for?” “ Mamma says we ought to be thankful that we have the raisins to fix.” “ Hear it! Listen to it! Does she say Peggy Hopkins ought to be thankful for the rheumatism?” “ Mamma says Peggy Hopkins is contented; but I don’t believe I know what that has to do with the raisins.” “ I >e £gy Hopkins’ rheumatism keeps her lame in the leg, so she cannot sport around and enjoy herself; what is the difference if it is raisins, pumpkin and citron, or if it is rheumatism, that keeps you sitting in a corner or hanging over afire?’ r “ Regetta! we have the nice things to eat after we have helped to make them, but Peggy —oh! what a pain she has, and nothing to eat but what people send her.’ “ Well, she doesn’t have to broil herself to death cooking it; somebody does it for her, and, as to pain, I guess she is too old and tough to feel much of that;” and Regetta laughed at what she thought a bit of pleasantry, and tossed the raisins she had been gathering up into the bowl. " 1 shall wot do much thanking, at any rate.” “ Oh, Regetta!” The little girl turned half around, that the tears quivering in her eyes might be unseen. “Oh, Regetta? What has Regetta to thank for? What does she do, the week through, but stew over tho pans?—and there is nothing but misery, anyway; for father has lost his work, Billy’s spasms are getting worse, and the brindlc cow has gone dry, when she ought to be milking a plenty.” “ But,” began Dotty (trying to say some of tho things that were halfshapen in her thoughts), “ but father is not dead, like Austin Bonicr’s father, and wo’ve got two cows yet, to give quarts and quarts; and don’t you think it is nicer to make the nice things than not to have any at all to eat? I know it is bad about Billy, but mamma says that God knows best.” She stopped, flushed with the effort she had madd to tell her thoughts. There was a low rap at the door, and the call, “Come in,” from Regetta, brought in a small, scantily-clad figure, shivering at the kitchen door. " Oh, you’ve got a fire, haven’t you?” said the little new-comer, nestling up to the red-hot stove, where the pots were blubbering over, and the odor of good l things was very strong. "Fire? Well, if I ever! Fire, when the wind is blasting like that outside; who wouldn’t have ftreP” “Everybody has it that can, I suppose; but you know it takes so much wood to keep it burning all the time, some people cannot. Tim—that’s my ’'brother—and I got a great lot yesterday, but we'do not want to burn it right tip in a minute.” " Doesn’t your father get the wood?” inquired Regetta, looking up, as she knelt on one knee, giving the last poke to the! log with which she was replenishing the fire. “ There is nobody but us; father is dead.”

“Tim Stryker is good to cut and haul wood; why don’t your mother get him to do it P Are your woods nearP” “Judge Swift lets ns go to his woods for fagots and things; you know we have no woods; to mother getting anybody, why, flbther has us, you know.” “Barbary Brennan—that is your name, isn’t itP—got youT' “ Yes, and she says that, of all tho things she has to be thankful for, sho is most thankful for us.” “ 'thankful for it? It is you who lives at the old Swift Lodge, that is all tumbled down but one roomP” , “Yes.” “And your mother broke her arm?” “ Why, yes, but it is her left arm; think how much worso it might havo been had it been the right. Mother says that mercies are all the time coming to her.” “ Does your mother wear spectacles?” “No; yes—sometimes,” looking up, wonderingly. “ I thought so, for it must take big glasses to see her mercies.” “I don’t know, but mother says sho will have a great deal to be thankful for to-morrow; but I was forgetting: mother has heard all about yourbrother who is sick, and she is sorry for him; she sent these herbs to make a tea, and a paper to tell how he must take the tea, for she is sure it will make him better.” Regetta stood with the herbs in her hands, as tho little figure turnod to tho door, leaving the great roaring fire regretfully, and dropping a courtesy as she said, “ Good-bye.” “ Won’t the pumpkin burnP” inquired Dotty, on her tiptoes over the stove. “Like as not,” broke out Regetta. “I’ll give up forever about mercies, if that woman in the Lodge has any; and now I think of it, Dotty, it is something to have father, even if ne is out of work; and to have woods, and some one to cut up trees.” And when, the next day, Dotty saw Regetta tying on her bonnet, to go carry a “Thanksgiving” to the old Swift Lodge, and afterward saw her so still and reverent when the Thanksgiving prayers were said at servicetime, she felt sure that, after all, Regetta did see mercies and was, for sure anil certain, giving thanks.— George Klingle, in N. Y. Observer ,