UNCLE TOM'S CABIN

and flatteries ; and when Marie became mother
to a beautifuldaughter, he reallyfelt awakened,
for a time,to somethinglike tenderness.
St. Clare's,mother had been a woman of uncommon
elevationand purity of character,and he
He had taken her with him on a tour
his cousin,Miss
to return with him to his
LIFE AMONG THE LOWLY. CI
Whoever has travelled in the New England had resolved to go was fully before the public
States will remember,in some cool village, the mind, she was solemnly invited out to tea by all
largefarm-house,with its clean-swept grassy her friends and neighbors for the space of a fortnight,
yard,shaded by the dense and massive foliage of
and her prospects and plansdulycanvassed
the sugar-maple; and remember the air of order and inquiredinto. Miss Moseley,who came into
and stillness, of perpetuityand unchanging repose,
the house to help to do the dress-making, acquired
that seemed to breathe over the whole place. dailyaccessions of importancefrcm the
Nothinglost,or out of order ; not a picketloose developments with regard to Miss Ophelia's
in the fence, not a particleof litterin the turfywardrobe which she had been enabled to make.
yard, with its clumps of lilac-bushes growingup It was credibly ascertained that SquireSine! are,
under the windows. Within,he will remember as his name was commonlycontracted in the
wide,clean rooms, where
nothingever seems to neighborhood, had counted out fiftydollars,and
be doing or going to be done,where everything is given them to Miss Ophelia,and told her to buy
once and forever rigidly in place,and where all any clothes she thought best ; and that two new
household arrangements move with the punctualsilk dresses,and a bonnet, had been sent for from
exactness of the old clock in the corner. In the Boston. As to the
.propriety of this ex'raordinary
outlayțhe public mind was
family "
keeping-room," as it is termed, he will
-
divided, some
remember the staid,respectableold book-case, affirming that it was well enough,all thingsconsidered,
with its glassdoors,where Fein's History, for once in one's life,and others stoutly
Progress,
a more merciless exactor of love from others than Milton's Paradise Lost,Bunyan's Pilgrims
a thoroughly selfishwoman ; and the more unlovely
and Scott's Family Bible, stand side by
she grows,
the more jealously and scrupulously
side in decorous order, with multitudes of other
she exacts love,to the uttermost farthing. books,equallysolemn and respectableThere
When, there fon.
,
St.Clare began to drop offthose are- no servants in the house,but the ladyin the
gallantries
and small attentions which flowed at snowy cap, with the spectacles, who sits sewing
firstthroughthe habitude of courtship, he found every afternoon among her daughters, as if nothing
his sultana no way readyto resign h^r slave ;
ever had been done,or were to be done,"
there were abundance of tears, poufcngs, and she and her girls, in some fore
long-forgotten
small tempests, there were discontents,pinings, part of the day, " did up the ivnrk" and for the
upbraidings Ṣt. Clare was good-natured and rest of the time,probably, at all hours when you
self-indulgent, and sought to buy off with presents
would see them, it is " done up." The old
kitchen floor never seems stained or spotted; the
taldesțhe chairs,and the various cookingutensils,
never seem deranged or disordered ; though
three and sometimes four meals a day are got
there,though the familywashing and ironingis
gave to this child his mother's name, fondly fancying
there performed, and though poundsof butter
that she would prove a reproduction of her and cheese are in some silentand mysterious
image. The thinghad been remarked with petulant
manner there broughtinto existence.
jealousy by his wife,and she regarded her On such a farm,in such a house and family,
husband's absorbing devotion to the child with Miss Ophelia had spent a quiet existence of some
suspicion and dislike ; all that was givento her forty-five years, when her cousin invited her to
seemed so much taken from herself. From the visit his southern mansion. The eldest of a large
time of the birth of thischild,her health gradually
family șhe was stillconsidered by her father
sunk. A life of constant inaction,bodilyand mother as one of "the children,"and the
and the frictionof ceaselessennui and
mental," proposalthat she should go to Orleans was a most
discontent,united to the ordinary weakness momentous one to the familycircle. The old
which attended the period of "
maternity, in gray-headed father took down Morse's Atlas out
course of a few years changed the bloomingof the book-case,and looked out the exact latitude
young
belle into a yellow,faded,sicklywoman,
and longitude ; and read Flint'sTravels in
whose time was divided among a variety of fanciful
the South and West, to make up his own mind as
diseases, and who considered herself,in to the nature of the country.
every sense, the most ill-usedand "
suffering person
The goodmother inquired, anxiously, if Orleans
in existence.
wasn't an awful wicked place,"saying,
There was no end of her various complaints ; that " it seemed to her most equal to going to
but her principal forte appearedto lie in sickheadache,which
sometimes would confine her to heathen."
the Sandwich Islands,or anywhereamong
the
her room three days out of six. As, of course, It was known at the minister's, and at the
all familyarrangementsfell into the hands of doctor's, and at Miss Pea'body's milliner shop,
servants, St. Clare found his menage anythingthat Ophelia St. Clare was "
talking about " going
but comfortable. His onlydaughter was exceedingly
away down to Orleans with her cousin ; and
delicate, and he feared that,with no one to of course the whole village could do no less than
look after her and attend to her,he" health and help tliis very importantprocess of talkingabout
lifemightyetfall a sacrificeto her mother's inefficiency.
the matter. The minister,who inclined strongly
to abolitionistviews,Avas quitedoubtful whether
to Vermont, and had j)ersuaded
such a stepmightnot tend somewhat to encourage
Ophelia St. Clare, the southerners in holding on to theirslaves ;
southern residence ; and they are now returning while the doctor,who was a stanch colonizationist,inclined
to the opinion that Miss Ophelia
on this boat,where we have introduced them to
our readers.
ought to go, to show the Orleans peoplethat we
And now, while the distant domes and spiresdon't think hardlyof them, after all. He was of
ofNew Orleans rise to our view,there is yettime opinion,
fact,that southern
for an introduction to Miss Ophelia.
When, however, the fact that she
peopleneeded encouraging.