Amanda: A Daughter of the MennonitesMyers, Anna Balmer
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Amanda: A Daughter of the Mennonites
Myers, Anna Balmer
Mennonites -- Fiction
"You fool yourself," was Millie's wise answer. "Is there ever a woman
born that don't think 'bout it? Women ain't made that way. There ain't
one so ugly nor poor, nor dumb, that don't hanker about it sometimes,
even if she knows it ain't for her."
Here the entrance of Amanda cut short the discussion.
"Millie," asked the girl, "shall I go to market with you this week?"
"Why, yes. I'd be glad for you. Of course, you always help get things
ready here and your Uncle Amos drives me in and helps to get the
baskets emptied and the things on the counters, but I could use you in
sellin'."
"Then I'll come. This lovely spring weather makes me want to go. I like
to see the people come in to buy flowers and early vegetables. It's
like reading a page out of a romance to see the expressions on the
faces of the city people as they buy the products of the country."
"Ach, I don't know what you mean. I guess you got too much fine
learnin' for me. But all I can see in market is people runnin' up one
aisle and down the other to see where the onions or radishes is the
cheapest."
Amanda laughed. "That's part of the romance. It proves they are human."
The following Saturday Amanda accompanied Millie to the Lancaster
market to help dispose of the assortment of farm products the Reist
stall always carried.
Going to market in Lancaster is an interesting experience. In addition
to the famous street markets, where farmers display their produce along
the busy central streets of the city, there are indoor markets where
crowds move up and down and buy butter, eggs and vegetables, and such
Pennsylvania Dutch specialties as mince meat, cup cheese, sauerkraut,
pannhaus, apple butter, fresh sausage and smear cheese. While lovers of
flowers choose from the many old-fashioned varieties--straw flowers,
zinnias, dahlias.
The Reist stall was one of the prominent stalls of the market. Twice
every week Millie "tended market" there. On the day before market
several members of the Reist household were kept busy preparing all the
produce, and the next day before dawn Uncle Amos hitched the horse to
the big covered wagon and he and Millie, sometimes Amanda and Philip,
drove over the dark country roads to the city.
Amanda enjoyed the work. She arranged the glistening domes of cup
cheese, placed the fresh eggs in small baskets, uncovered one of the
bags of dried corn untied the cloth cover from a gray earthen crock of
apple butter, and then stood and looked about the market house. She
felt the human interest it never failed to waken in her. Behind many
stalls stood women in the quaint garb of the Church of the Brethren or
Mennonite. But quaintest of all were the Amish.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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