OLD ALMANACS. 



29 



IT is a dilapidated outbuilding now, and the 

 merest ghost of its former self. Scarcely one of 

 the many marked features of the old kitchen is 

 left. The cavernous fireplace, the corner cup- 

 board, the narrow box staircase, the heavy dou- 

 ble doors, with their long strap hinges, the long 

 narrow table by the south windows, have all been 

 removed. And sad, too, to think that, one by 

 one, the sturdy farmer folk that lived in and loved 

 this now dark and dingy room have all passed 

 away. For me, it is the Mecca to which I most 

 fondly turn when indulging in retrospection. In 

 and about it were passed many of those peculiar- 

 ly happy days, the recollection of which grows 

 brighter as the years roll by. From late autumn 

 until spring, when for five months the. nights were 

 long, this kitchen was the favorite rendezvous, 

 and conversation, rather than reading, the popular 

 amusement. Not that there were no books in 

 the house. There were fifty volumes, at least, 

 in the old book-case, but I can not recall one in 

 the hands of a reader. There are many of them 

 now on my own shelves Gibbon, Johnson, Gold- 

 smith, Burns, and the journal of many a Quaker 

 of colonial times. It would be unfair to say that 

 books were unpopular, but rather that conversa- 



