Contending Forces

see them have a pleasant time, but father did not like it. Your grandfather worked hard and at night was very tired, so the dear old man would go to bed soon after his supper and pipe. Then was the girls’ time. A fire was made in the parlor, which was at the front of the house, a good distance away from father’s room, and by the time the young man arrived to make his call the old gentleman was generally sound asleep. One night, however, things did not work so well. In those days we had large open fireplaces; stoves did not come in until I was about five years old. I can see that low-ceiled parlor now with its brick hearth and brass andirons holding the glowing logs, the flames crackling and shooting upward, the firelight dancing and shining on the little cupboard doors on each side of the chimney. There was a rag carpet on the floor⁠—your grandmother made her own carpets from rags; and our floors were covered with large handmade rag mats, for no housekeeper was counted much who did not have a large supply of such things. There were china figures on the mantel, and vases filled with goldenrod gathered the summer before. The furniture was mahogany, polished until you could see your face in any part of it. There was a red cloth on the table which stood between the two windows, and in the center of it was a large astral lamp trimmed about the edges with long crystal pendants, which we children called diamonds. We thought nothing could be more elegant than that lamp. It was a wedding present to your grandmother.”

“Did you have kerosene in those days, ma?” asked Dora.

“Lord bless you, no; we burned whale oil or sperm oil in that lamp. Poor people used candles. Your grandmother used to save her fat and clarify it and mix it with beeswax to harden it, and we made our candles every week as regularly as we did the family cooking. Sometimes there was danger of the supply of oil giving out in the stores, and then oil cost a great deal of money; that never lasted long, however, and in a few weeks some New Bedford whaler would be in port with a large cargo of whale oil, and then there would be a big supply selling cheap.”

“I don’t see how you got along without stoves and things,” observed Dora; “baking day must have been a terror.”

“We had tin kitchens and Dutch ovens. We never had any trouble.”

“What’s a tin kitchen?” asked John.

“It’s an oven made of tin, for roasting meat. It stood on four legs about a foot from the floor, and had a place fer a charcoal fire at the back, and a chimney to carry off the smoke. The front fastened by a hasp to the back and could be let down to put the food on the little grate inside. It was a very convenient arrangement, and I wish I had one this minute. A Dutch oven was very much like our iron kettles which we use for boiling; there was a grate inside to hold the food.”

“It must have been a great nuisance keeping house under such circumstances.”

“Well, what became of the young man that particular evening, ma?” chimed in Will.

“This night father was restless and did not retire with his usual promptness, and we had only just got him out of the way when the expected caller arrived. However, everything went on very well, and you may be sure that there was much peeping and giggling on the part of the half-grown sisters who were denied the great privilege of the parlor and company as yet. Your grandmother sat in the kitchen knitting and trying to keep the younger children in order, when to her consternation the door opened and in walked father. ‘Elizabeth,’ said he, ‘I hear a man’s voice in the parlor. What’s the trouble?’ Poor mother tried to explain, and murmured something about a gentleman calling on Fanny. ‘A man,’ roared father, ‘calling on my daughter!’ and the first thing we knew, he seized the bucket of water from the kitchen dresser⁠—we had wells in those days, and a bucket of water always stood on the dresser⁠—and started for the parlor and flung the door open. Without speaking to the astonished occupants of the room, he stalked to the fireplace and deliberately poured the water upon the blazing wood; then he turned to the caller and said: ‘Young man, if you have a home, go to it; this is no halfway house for the accommodation of young squirts. Fanny,’ he said, turning to your aunt, ‘you go to bed, and don’t let this thing occur again.’ The young man left as quickly as possible, and poor Fanny retired to her room greatly mortified.”

“That’s good discipline for girls,” said John with a laugh. “If we had more fathers after that stamp, we fellows would get better wives.”

“And we girls better husbands,” chimed in Dora. “Still, I pity poor Aunt Fanny.”

“The fellow wasn’t much or he’d have stuck, and not been driven off that way. I’d have made the old gentleman like me in spite of himself if I had meant business,” said Will. “Oh, by the by, did your new lodger come, Dora?”

“Yes; and, Will, I never met anyone so beautiful in all my life. You’ll be fascinated when you meet her.”

“That’s you all over, Dora; all your swans generally turn out geese. I’ll bet you a new pair of Easter gloves that she’s a rank old maid with false teeth, bald head, hair on her upper lip⁠—”

“All right, Will Smith, all right. Just wait until you see her! I’ll wager a new pair of embroidered silk suspenders that you’re over head and ears in love with her long before that time.”

“I’ll hold the stakes,” cried John.

They rose from the table now, and John said, with a tender glance at Dora: “I