Annals of our ancestors; one hundred and fifty years of history in the ...

ANNAT.S OF OUR ANCESTORS 147
citizens. One morning in spring I went out to feed my charges,
three pretty heifer calves. As usual I carried out the warm
milk and placed it in position and began to call them, but I
called in vain. I went down into the pasture, but no frisky
calves were there. When I reported our loss to mother she
decided that a thief had come out in the night and captured
them and had them dressed for market by daylight.
A horse was also stolen from us during the year, and a
drove of fine stock hogs which father had in a pen by the road-
side. These were probably being driven off to be fattened
upon waste from stills. When the thieves got them as far as
the crossroads two fine hogs made their escape, so we had our
own meat that year after all, though not in the usual quantity.
Nor were these thefts all. Our neighbor, James Cummings,
saved a calf for us once. He was aroused in the night by hear-
ing a calf bawl and a disturbance in our barnyard, so he arose
and dressed and went hurriedly to investigate, when he discovered
a butcher and his wagon standing in the big road, with
a large heifer calf bound and ready to be lifted into the wagon.
On hearing Mr. Cummings approaching the thief left the calf
and drove rapidly away towards the north where the road
would lead him over to the pike, that he might return speedily
to the city and be lost in the multitude.
James Cummings was a good neighbor, and both our broth-
ers liked him. His land joined ours on the south. He had a
family of four girls, all good and industrious, and friends and
schoolmates of ours. I remember when they first started to
school, the dear little chubby, round-faced girls — Melissa,
Addie, Emma, and Ella. James Cummings died before old
age, but his good wife, Mrs. Selina Cummings, lived to be
more than 90 years old and retained through all the long years
" the ornament of a meek and quiet spirit" which is above price.
Since beginning these written memories of the past, I have
heard through her devoted daughters of her passing into rest.
For more than fifty years we have been friends, and their
letters come to me yet with a loving interest. It is good that
these friendships have lasted through all the years, from the
time I was a big schoolgirl and they little girls with wide,