Newspaper Page Text
6
Worth Womans While
Take Heed How You Borrow.
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E passed a very uncomfortable day re
cently because of an incident too trivial
for the mental upsetting of any broad
minded person we are perfectly con
vinced, too insignificant to acknowledge
even to ourselves, and yet there is no
denying that what would have been a
pleasant day was completely spoiled.
Our neighbor sent in for the morning paper; we
had not read it ourselves, and sent it with the re
quest that it be returned soon, that we had not yet
read it, and would take our turn afterwards. It
was not an offensive message, certainly—we had not
intended it to be so, —but how” it was delivered by
the child who took it we can only surmise, for the
paper came back at once; and when we insitsed that
it be kept until read, and sent it again, in the short
est while it was the second time returned. By this
we had become very uncomfortable, indeed, and
thoroughly dissatisfied with our own unneighborli
ness—Why had we not let it go without a word, and
if it never came back, done without it? There have
been times when we had such experience, for people
who are eager themselves to read sometimes do not
remember thata you may desire the same privilege
after them; we have had our paper borrowed while
while still fresh and never brought home again,
and we do not see at this day and hour that we lost
out in consequence on any important issue of life.
Why could not we have let it go again so—for we
value our neighbor, and would rather do without both
morning and afternoon papers than give offense to
one we hold in such high regard. What could the
child have said? Something was wrong somewhere,
for the paper had twice come back.
Some Results of Borrowing.
It set us thinking, whether it were not better
never to borrow except in cases of necessity. Now,
we are frank to say we have a genuine attachment
for our borrowing neighbor, who with all the confi
dence of her generous soul sends in without hesita
tion to us for just anything not at hand in the mo
ment of need; it gives us a sort of warmth about
the heart that we can send over to her to get change
for a dollar when our gas meter announces itself out
of fuel, and to know that she will oblige us with the
utmost willingness, or if she cannot will just send
the desired quarter that the cooking of the dinner
may not be interrupted. Anything from her books
to baking soda she would loan as cheerfully.
And yet that paper—We fell to wondering if
sometimes it might not inconvenience her to change
the money—small change is so valuable an asset to
housekeeping—or if she might not need the eggs she
let us have before we had got in our fresh supply
to repay her—eggs are as necessary as change.
And suppose, needing that change, she cried in dis
tress and perplexity, “Oh, if only I bad kept that
quarter for my own gas!” Or—“lf my eggs had
not been borrowed, I would have enough for my
pudding!” Do our little neighborly requests oc
casion her trouble like that? Or, worse still, are
there ever any little complications, unbeknownst to
us, which involve the mental worriment and regret
the incident of the paper has cost us? Heaven fore
fend!—Why could not we have provided ourselves
ahead for the inexorable maw of that onward
marching meter, and foreseen that the eggs would
run short?
One Sided Exchanges.
An amusing little colloquy took place the other
day which must have embarrassed the chief parties
to an overworked system of borrowing, if they
heard. We do not know whether or not they did.
A mutual friend, an early riser, heard voices in the
rear of her next door neighbor’s, and recognized the
servant? of the two houses in stormy altercation.
The Golden Age for June 28, 1906.
By FLORENCE TUCKER
Out of the excitement presently floated up to her
this:
“Yo’ all ain’t nothin’ but ole po white trash no
how—Won’t even loan me a little lard for my
brekfus—jes’ a little lard to make up my biscuits
for my brekfus!”
“Sen’ back them things what you already ber
ried! Gimme back dat flour; gimme back dat cof
fee; sen’ dat scrubbin’-bo’ad back here; gimme
back dat sody—Turn back all them things what you
done borried!”
Thet speaker was in high dudgen; the respect
ability of Gier white folks,’ was assailed, and by
the very people who had borrowed, from her repre
sentation, practically everything that kitchen or
larder called for—at least, by their servant, which
was the same thing. It was undeniably amusing,
but how humiliating! And what a nuisance those
borrowers must have made themselves to the long
suffering people next door!
We recalled the words of a dear little boy in
Charleston whose grandmother was overfond, he
thought, of sending him on errands to a neighbor’s.
Finally one day he protested—‘Grandma,” he said,
‘I should like very much to oblige you, but you
know the Bible says, don’t let your foot be found
going too often to your neighbor’s house!”
And we have thought it out this way: we may
become a vexation to our neighbor; we may occa
sion her serious inconvenience, even discomfort—
unhappiness possibly, if misunderstanding arise; in
the mouths of servants we will become a reproach.
And it appears to us the Scriptural application of
little Tommy would be good for ourselves, and we
have tried to write it on our mind in such way that
we won’t forget, “not to let our foot be found go
ing too often to our neighbor’s house a-borrowing!”
A Bargain in Potatoes.
A woman got a bargain last week in a peck of
potatoes, and has been worrying over it ever since.
Which statement is anomalous on the face of it,
for what woman ever rued a bargain? And this
woman in particular—any who know her must smile
at the mere suggestion. And potatoes selling at
sixty cents a peck too! But what must one do, with
the exorbitant price of things, when if not actually
eating our heads off, as the saying goes, we are
eating up our clothes and all the many other things
that would add to our comfort and happiness—
paying for food what ought to buy them all. What
would you do if you needed potatoes, and had but a
lean purse that day, and a silly old thing from the
country came along and offered, actually offered,
them to you at—Why, at the ridiculous price of
twenty-five cents! But pray, don’t ask us what we
would have done!
It was just this way: As she walked out onto
the porch a wagon came lumbering by, and a voice
called, “Beans, potatoes, apples! Beans, pota
toes— ” She let him get no further.
“What are your potatoes?” she asked, looking in
her economical soul to find them cheaper than at
the grocer’s, certainly less than sixty cents a peck.
He was a black-faced, kindly old soul from the
country sure enough. He drew in his team and
called up to her, “Well, twenty-five cents, I
reck’n!”
“Twenty-five cents?” she said pleasantly.
“Well, I’ll take them!” Nor showed by a muscle
of her face that she knew she was getting them too
cheap, or that he coud get twice as much if only be
knew the price of things,—evidently he had not
been to town in a long time.
He filled the measure and heaped it up almost to
toppling off—good, sound, fresh potatoes; none of
the sort that we sometimes get in the market with
the skins all bleached and curled by some chemical
process to look just right and gold for ‘-flew
toes.” They were just what she wanted, and she
walked into the house and displayed them.
“See,” she said—“all these for twenty-five
cents, and potatoes selling at sixty cents the peck!”
But—and this comes of having to use a very full
conscience with a very thin purse—her satisfaction
was only momentary. The old innocent negro was
scarcely out of sight when she began to feel qualms.
“I declare it was not right,” she said to herself—
“it was a shame to do the poor old fellow so!”
She ought to have given him more she reflected,
and then with a glance at the purse that had been
so drawn upon it would hardly have reached so far
as a sixty cent peck, she recalled that he had only
asked twenty-five, and if she had not taken them
somebody else would have gotten them at the same
price.
But there was small solace in that. “It w T as his
ignorance. And I knew better—and it was not
quite honest of me”—The more she thought about
it, the more her conscience prodded, till finally she
knew that she, her real self inside, had been dis
honest and had tacitly defrauded, taken advantage
of another’s failing to know. It was only an old
negro, and undoubtedly he would have sold to some
one else at the same price, but the very facts made
it only the worse; he was just a poor negro, and
others would treat him unfairly undoubtedly, so it
was, indeed, too bad that she should have done him
so.
He was gone—she had never seen him before,
and likely never would again—what could be done?
Nothing;—poor old fellow! But worse than his
plight was her own; he had simply missed getting
the full value of his goods,—she had the goods, only
half of which were honestly hers, and with them the
consciousness that they were illgotten gain; and
what she endured in mental conflict more than out
weighed the balance which she could have wished
had fallen the other way. It was a day of experi
ence—we have it from herself—and from indica
tions, experience which will stand her in good stead
the next time she buys from an old man like that, or
perhaps we were better to say will stand him in
good stead.
Funny, any way, about women and bargains.
Things to Forget.
If you see a tall fellow ahead of a crowd,
A leader of men, marching fearless and proud,
And you know of a tale whose mere telling aloud
Would cause his proud head to in anguish be bowed,
It’s a pretty good plan to forget it.
If you know of a skleleton hidden away
Tn a closet, and guarded, and kept from the day
In the dark; and whose showing, whose sudden dis
play,
Would cause grief and sorrow and lifelong dismay,
It’s a pretty good plan to forget it.
If you know of a thing that will darken the joy
Os a man or a woman, a girl or a boy,
That will wipe out a smile or the least way annoy
A fellow, or cause any gladness to cloy,
It’s a pretty good plan to forget it.
—Answers.
Be on the lookout for mercies. The moiv we look
for them, the more of them will we see. Blessings
brighten when we count them. Out of the deter
mination of the heart the eyes see. If you .want
to be gloomy, there’s gloom enough to keep you
glum; if you want to be glad, there’s gleam enough
to keep you glad. Say, “Bless the Lord, omy sou',
and forget not all His benefits.” Better lose count
in enumerating your blessings than lose your bless
ings in telling over your troubles.—Maltbie D. Bab-
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