"Me a-restin' on this here bench 'Mongst all these trees and flowers and sich; A park! You say? It's a nice place To drive your team and stop and hitch. "Farm? Yes, we've got a good one; Two hundred acres as fine as you'll see, We're purty well fixed as to worldly things, We've worked hard for it, Betsy and me. "But there's one thing keeps me mighty sad, We can't get over it, night or day. Never an hour we don't think of Jim-- Ten years now, since he went away. "Dead?--No; just got mad and left. Never a word have we heard from him; Ten years of waitin', hopin', and prayin' Jest fur one more sight of Jim. "Jest about your height, young man; Slender and straight as a stalk of corn; Good as gold, though quick to get angry-- But, then he was mine and Betsy's first-born. "I think if I could git hold of Jim's hand, And kinder explain the words I said, He'd know his old dad's heart would ever Be just the same--but I guess Jim's dead. "Or he never--what's that you say, sir? You Jim!--My God!--it can't be true! Come to my heart, boy--closer, closer-- Can it be Jim--oh, can it be you? "Run quick and call your mother! She's in the store--come quick again; I'll wait here for you. . . . . . . Here! Police! Police! That young feller's got my watch and chain!" Board and Ancestors The snake reporter of the Post was wending his way homeward last night when he was approached by a very gaunt, hungry-looking man with wild eyes and an emaciated face. "Can you tell me, sir," he inquired, "where I can find in Houston a family of lowborn scrubs?" "I don't exactly understand," said the reporter. "Let me tell you how it is," said the emaciated man. "I came to Houston a month ago, and I hunted up a boarding house, as I can not afford to live at a hotel. I found a nice, aristocratic-looking place that suited me, and went inside. The landlady came in the parlor and she was a very stately lady with a Roman nose. I asked the price of board, and she said: 'Eighty dollars per month.' I fell against the door jamb with a dull thud, and she said: "'You seem surprised, sah. You will please remember that I am the widow of Governah Riddle of Virginia. My family is very highly connected; give you board as a favah; I never consider money an equivalent to advantage of my society. Will you have a room with a door in it?' "'I'll call again,' I said, and got out of the house, somehow, and went to another fine, three-storied house, with a sign 'Board and Rooms' on it. "The next lady I saw had gray curls, and a soft gazelle-like eye. She was a cousin of General Mahone of Virginia and wanted $16 per week for a little back room with a pink motto and a picture of the battle of Chancellorsville in it. "I went to some more boarding houses.