On an old oaken
table, well rubbed and polished, lay the family Bible and
prayer-book, and the drawer contained the family library,
composed of about half a score of well-thumbed volumes. An
ancient clock, that important article of cottage furniture,
ticked on the opposite side of the room, with a bright
warming-pan hanging on one side of it, and the old man's
horn-handled Sunday cane on the other. The fireplace, as usual,
was wide and deep enough to admit a gossip knot within its jambs.
In one corner sat the old man's granddaughter sewing, a pretty
blue-eyed girl, and in the opposite corner was a superannuated
crony whom he addressed by the name of John Ange, and who, I
found, had been his companion from childhood. They had played
together in infancy; they had worked together in manhood; they
were now tottering about and gossiping away the evening of life;
and in a short time they will probably be buried together in the
neighboring churchyard. It is not often that we see two streams
of existence running thus evenly and tranquilly side by side; it
is only in such quiet "bosom scenes" of life that they are to be
met with.
I had hoped to gather some traditionary anecdotes of the bard
from these ancient chroniclers, but they had nothing new to
impart.
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