The  RURAL.  NEW- YORKER 
The  Pastoral  Parson  and  His  Country 
Folks 
(Continued  from  Page  124) 
sleigh  with  all  the  other  things.  By  the 
time  the  Parson  got  to  the  church  the 
sleigh  was  well  filled  with  boys  to  help 
get  ready  and  trim  the  trees — we  had 
two  here — and  the  church  wTas  all  nice 
and  warm.  Such  a  fine  time  as  we  had. 
We  tried  to  count  them ;  there  seemed 
to  be  just  about  TO  people.  Two  families 
seemed  to  have  furnished  IS — a  fair 
starter.  One  truck  load  got  stuck  in  the 
snow  on  the  way.  The  people  finished  the 
trip  on  foot  and  the  men  folks  had  to  go 
back  and  get  a  horse  and  sled  and  get 
the  truck  out.  and  the  whole  thing  was 
just  over  when  they  arrived  at  the  church. 
The  Parson  stayed  down  all  night,  and 
just  before  daybreak  the  storm  broke 
against  the  window  pane.  The  Parson 
got  started  off  early,  before  the  snow 
would  get  too  deep.  How  it  did  come 
down,  hail  and  sleet  and  snow.  How  the 
little  Italian  children  waved  at  the  win¬ 
dows  as  the  Parson  drove  by !  As  the 
sleet  cut  against  his  face  the  12  miles 
home,  and  froze  his  mittens  and  coat  as 
stiff  as  boards,  he  thought  of  all  these 
children,  Italians  and  Jews  and  Ger¬ 
mans  and  (one  family)  Americans,  hap¬ 
py  and  playing  with  the  things  they  got 
on  the  tree  the  night  before  and  talking 
about  the  beautiful  pictures  of  the  Magi 
and  the  angels  and  the  shepherds  with 
their  flocks  and  the  Christ  Child  in 
the  manger  and  the  little  town  of  Bethle¬ 
hem  with  its  fiat  roof  houses  and  the 
flight  away  from  Ilerod,  away  down  into 
Egypt,  which  they  saw  on  the  screen  the 
night  before. 
The  Gleaning.- — The  Parson  has  one 
more  Christmas  trip  in  mind,  a  sort  of 
gleaning  trip  for  those  families,  big  and 
needy  families,  so  far  back  and  so  shift¬ 
ing,  always  moving  from  one  place  to  an¬ 
other,  quite  likely  following  a  sawmill,  that 
they  really  have  not  had  much  of  a  Christ¬ 
mas.  Thanks  to  good  people  and  good 
ladies’  societies  around  the  State,  the 
Parson  still  has  plenty  of  presents  saved 
for  this  very  trip,  with  some  good  warm 
clothing  for  any  who  need.  This  will 
probably  be  a  three-day  trip,  and  quite 
likely  the  happiest  of  them  all. 
A  Find. — The  Parson  did  make  a  find 
a  while  ago.  While  holding  a  little  ser¬ 
vice  down  in  an  abandoned  farmhouse — 
a  noon  service  while  the  children  were 
having  their  school  nooning — one  child 
told  him  that  her  mother  wanted  to  have 
some  children  baptized.  So  he  went  off 
down  about  two  miles  further  to  the 
house.  There  were  11  children  in  the 
family.  Later  three  were  baptized  and 
three  confirmed  by  the  bishop  when  he 
came.  But  the  mother  was  very  frail, 
and  Mrs.  Parson  remarked  after  being 
down  that  way  one  day  that  “she  would 
never  live  through  the  coming  of  the  next 
little  one.”  The  telephones  wires  went 
by  the  house,  fortunately,  so  the  Parson 
had  a  ’phone  put  in  as  the  first  step. 
But  when  the  little  one  eame  the  woman 
did  not  seem  to  rally.  After  a  couple  of 
weeks  a  fever  came  on  and  there  was 
danger  enough. 
That  Money. — And  here  is  where  that 
Rural  New-Yorker  money  came  in,  with 
some  other  that  was  also  given.  The 
Parson  guaranteed  the  hospital  bill  and 
paid  it.  She  was  there  two  weeks.  Then 
we  brought  her  out  here  to  our  house. 
Her  fever  has  gone,  but  she  is  so  weak 
and  thin.  As  the  Parson  writes  this 
minute  she  is  lying  on  the  sofa.  She 
wants  to  get  home  to  the  children  and 
babies,  but  Providence  has  taken  a  hand 
in  the  matter — a  direct  hand— and  kept 
the  snow  so  deep  and  the  roads  so  drifted 
that  it  is  impossible  to  get  her  home  even 
with  a  sleigh,  except  you  go  such  a  long 
way  round  that  the  trip  would  be  too 
much  for  her.  She  ought  to  stay  here 
several  weeks  and  let  her  husband  con¬ 
tinue  to  have  the  privilege  and  pleasure 
of  taking  care  of  the  11  children — 11  at 
home  now  !  He  had  little  or  nothing  to 
do  with  the  care  of  these  hitherto,  and  a 
quiet  and  confidential  interview  with  him 
on  the  subject  and  care  of  11  children  in 
stormy  Winter  weather  in  a  small  house 
would  probably  be  wonderfully  interest¬ 
ing. 
The  Ice  Pond. — As  the  Parson  wrote 
a  while  ago.  we  went  and  made  a  big 
pond  this  last  Fall  and  hoped  to  cut  ice 
on  it,  as  well  as  to  have  a  great  time 
skating.  But  we  got  fooled  on  both, 
though  the  boys  had  quite  a  bit  of  skating 
before  the  snow  came.  You  have  to  live 
one  life  to  know  how  to  live  another,  and 
you  have  to  build  a  good  many  dams  to 
know  how  to  build  one  that  will  stand 
both  Winter  and  Summer.  We  filled  the 
dam  up  with  water,  up  to  within  a  few 
inches  of  the  fop.  It  is  not  a  dam  in  the 
main  brook,  but  a  hollowed-out  place  on 
the  flat,  and  we  turn  in  as  much  or  as 
little  brook  water  as  wTe  want.  But  when 
this  bank  of  soft  new  earth  began  to 
freeze  deeper  and  deeper,  the  frost  lifted 
the  part  frozen  and  the  water  began  to 
leak  through  under  it.  This  would  soon 
cause  serious  trouble,  so  we  stopped  any 
water  running  in  and  it  is  now  practical¬ 
ly  empty.  Probably  if  this  bank  (now 
wide  enough  to  drive  a  horse  on)  was 
about  a  foot  and  a  half  above  the  high- 
water  mark  and  pretty  well  sodded  over 
there  would  not  be  any  trouble.  No  one 
has  got  any  ice  here  yet,  and  it  looks  bad 
for  a  crop.  The  snow  is  15  to  18  in.  deep 
on  the  level  and  perfectly  beautiful  sleigh¬ 
ing  everywhere. 
Well,  the  Parson  must  stop  and  get 
this  off.  The  boys  have  been  practicing 
(Continued  on  Page  138) 
131 
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