Christine: Or Woman's Trials and Triumphs

16. The Old Homestead

133 ch a p ter si x teen The Old Homestead It was winter—the dreariest season of the year in the country ; and yet as Christine stood by the window the morning after Philip’s departure, and scraped off with her finger the delicate tracery of the frost upon the panes, the scene upon which she gazed did not look dreary to her. Wide plains of snow, interspersed here and there by clumps of evergreens, lay outspread before her; further on, her eye rested on the distant hills, on whose bold summits fell the first beams of the sun, which laboriously worked its way up from grey clouds that looked as if they were heavy with fresh snows; the farmhouse, with its low wall, surrounded, as by a rampart, with banks of snow, its yard, where, close to the orchard -fence, stood the heavy wood-sled; while a little further on were piles of wood, which it was a part of winter’s work to haul from the neighboring forests; and the barn-yard, filled, as it was, with cows, horses, oxen, and sheep, who crowded around the large tub, from which James Cameron was cutting the ice, that the cattle might take their morning draught, added life to the still picture. It looked very pleasant to her; even the bare skeletons of the orchard opposite inspired her with no gloomy thoughts. They   Christine 134 only reminded her of a hale old age; she had seen them in their promising spring-time, when the young leaves and buds had covered their dry branches, in a very luxuriance of beauty—she had seen them in their strength, in summer, when those buds had given place to growing fruit, when the birds had built their nests there, and sung there their sweetest songs; there, in the autumn, she had seen those limbs weighed down by the rosy fruit, which, in its perfect maturity, had well fulfilled the promise of the spring-buds and summer-birth, and now the task was done—the orchard rested from its labors, but in those dry limbs she knew that there was life; it was only now in a quiet sleep, ere long to be succeeded by a fresh awakening, a renewal of youth, a yearly resurrection. No, there was nothing dreary in winter, and, with a light heart, Christine obeyed the call of her sister to come to breakfast. She held her aching fingers over the cheerful fire that roared and blazed in the huge old fireplace, for a few minutes, and then moved aside for James, who came in shaking the snow off his mittens, and stamping the same from his boots on the wide and glowing hearth; then he rubbed his ears, which were very red, and declared that it was cold—a proposition which there was no disputing, and which made the breakfast-table, with its smoking viands, all the more inviting. The low walls and homely furniture of that farm-house formed a striking contrast to the elegances that had, for the past two years, surrounded Christine; but rough as it was, every plank in that old house was dear to her. She thought no longer of anything unpleasant in the past, but remembered only its joys. She busied herself now through the short days in assisting her mother and sister in their household tasks, laughing with them at her awkwardness, or sat at her work, plying her busy needle, and carolling merry songs. Every stitch was one link that drew her nearer to Philip; these garments were for Philip ’s wife; and so the task, which otherwise would have been a weary one, was pleasant to her. Christine 135 “I declare it really does me good,” said Farmer Elliot to his wife, “to see the gal so chipper, more like other folks. It was a good idee lettin’ on her go with Julia.” “Waal, I was alwus in favor of it, you know, father,” replied his wife, “and it has turned out well. She isn’t like the same girl she was two year ago.” Those two years had, indeed, effected a marvellous change in Christine. She was not beautiful, she never could be, except to loving hearts, who could read the beauty of her soul in her deep eye and in her changing countenance; but there was a charm about her, whether in her sweet, clear voice...