108 THE TIM BUNKER PAPERS. 



strawberries, and thought that the doctrines that kept 

 such company were good enough for them. The hardest 

 points in the catechism were taken on faith, and Shadtown 

 has always been as orthodox as it has been peaceable and 

 united. 



Now, I am not much of a philosopher, but I guess the 

 characters of the past ministers, being lovers of good fruit, 

 as well as of good men, have had something to do with the 

 prosperity of the parish. Their theology grew where their 

 fruit did, in the open air and sunshine ; and I guess light 

 and air are about as necessary for sermons as they are for 

 strawberries. Bad digestion makes a man s thoughts about 

 as sour as his stomach, and the acidity of the pulpit often 

 leavens the whole parish. 



The folks in Shadtown say that Josiah is walking in the 

 footsteps of his predecessors, only a little more so, that he 

 gets all the new pears and strawberries, and as soon as he 

 finds they are worth cultivating, he sends them out to his 

 neighbors. I found John s milking stools had come in 

 play, and the butter and cheese which Sally had made 

 with her own hands, were about equal to anything we have 

 in Hookertown. Mrs. Bunker says, that she will have to 

 own beat on housekeeping and butter-making, but it is 

 much safer for her to say that than it would be for any 

 body else in my hearing. She was very much pleased 

 with her visit, but most pleased with her first grandson, 

 whom they have named &quot;Timothy Bunker Slocurn.&quot; 

 Whether the child, or its name, made her absent-minded, 

 I am unable to say, but I noticed her spectacles on wrong 

 side up, twice in one morning, and that the knitting was 

 entirely forgotten. 



Yours to command, 



TIMOTHY BUNKER, ESQ. 

 Itookertown, Sept. 1st, 1859. 



