Fern Leaves from Fanny's Port-folio. Second SeriesFern, Fanny
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Fern Leaves from Fanny's Port-folio. Second Series
Fern, Fanny
American essays -- 19th century; Short stories, American
God speed the day when the Juggernaut wheels of Avarice shall no
longer roll over woman’s dearest hopes; when thousands of doors, now
closed, shall be opened for starving Virtue to earn her honest bread;
when he who would coin her tears and groans to rear his palaces, shall
become a hissing and a by-word, wherever the sacred name of Mother
shall be honored.
“WHO LOVES A RAINY DAY?”
The bored editor; who, for one millennial day, in slippered feet,
controls his arm chair, exchanges, stove, and inkstand; who has time
to hunt up delinquent subscribers; time to decipher hieroglyphical
manuscripts; time to make a bonfire of bad poetry; time to kick out
lozenge boys and image venders; time to settle the long-standing
quarrel between Nancy, the type-setter, and Bill, the foreman, and time
to write complimentary letters to himself for publication in his own
paper, and to get up a new humbug prospectus for the dear, confiding
public.
Who loves a rainy day?
The little child of active limb, reprieved from bench, and book, and
ferule; between whom and the wire-drawn phiz of grim propriety, those
friendly drops have drawn a misty vail; who is now free to laugh, and
jump, and shout, and ask the puzzling question--free to bask in the
sunny smile of her, to whom no sorrow can be trivial that brings a
cloud over that sunny face, or dims the brightness of that merry eye.
Who loves a rainy day?
The crazed clergyman, who can face a sheet of paper, uninterrupted by
dyspeptic Deacon Jones, or fault-finding brother Grimes; or cautious
Mr. Smith; or the afflicted Miss Zelia Zephyr, who, for several long
years, has been “unable to find out the path of duty;” or the zealous
old lady Bunce, who hopes her pastor will throw light on the precise
locality fixed upon in the future state for idiots, and those heathen
who have never seen a missionary.
Who loves a rainy day?
The disgusted clerk, who, lost in the pages of some care-beguiling
volume, forgets the petticoat destiny which relentlessly forces him to
unfurl endless yards of tinsel lace and ribbon, for lounging dames,
with empty brains and purses, whose “chief end” it seems to be to put
him through an endless catechism.
Who loves a rainy day?
The tidy little housewife, who, in neat little breakfast-cap and
dressing-gown, overlooks the short-comings of careless cook and
house-maid; explores cupboards, cellars, pantries, and closets;
disembowels old bags, old boxes, old barrels, old kegs, old firkins;
who, with her own dainty hand, prepares the favorite morsel for the
dear, absent, toiling husband, or, by the cheerful nursery fire, sews
on the missing string or button, or sings to soothing slumbers a pair
of violet eyes, whose witching counterpart once stole her girlish heart
away.
Who loves a rainy day?
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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