The boy who brought ChristmasMorgan, Alice (Fiction writer)
General
The boy who brought Christmas
Morgan, Alice (Fiction writer)
Christmas stories; North Carolina -- Fiction
“Sure ’nough; Mis’ Campbell says he’s a-restorin’ fourfold!”
“Thar’s the old sinner now,” grumbled Zeb; “talk about good folks and
they’re plumb sure to heave into sight.”
“Well, what about it? He’s a-drivin’ up!”
“Hullo in there! Zeb’lon!”
Just within the door but out of the old man’s sight, Aunt Dicey
counseled her grandson:
“You speak him fair, Zeb’lon, for they say he sure has got religion;
but I’ll stand on the porch with the gun whar he can see me good;
maybe that’ll keep him from backslidin’ all of a suddent.”
They went out together. Zeb said “Mornin’” but his tone was not
conciliatory.
“I’ve got a mighty pretty year-old colt up to my place; come of
first-class Kentucky stock. If you’re a mind to, you can come up and
git him, to pay for that thar tame deer I shot. G’long!”
Church was “in” when Aunt Dicey and Zeb drove up, and before they had
alighted and found a place to hitch among the two score beasts of
draught or burden that were disposed in the surrounding woods, church
was “out.” But the congregation didn’t disperse; they stood about in
groups discussing the wonderful events of the past week. Preacher
Carr came and stood in the doorway:
“Give me that old-time religion,” he sang out lustily, and his people
joined joyously in the refrain. Arsula Garrett always led the singing
and she followed him with:
“It was good for the Hebrew children,” and they kept on chanting
the efficacy of the “old-time religion” in the case of “the prophet
Daniel,” “the good Elijah,” “the psalmist David,” “poor old Noah,”
“the patriarch Abr’ham,” and, when they had exhausted Arsula’s list
of sacred-history heroes, they sang:
“It was good for my old mother,”
“It will be good in the time of trouble,”
“It will be good when the world’s on fire,”
and finally they rounded up the catalogue of human experiences and
human apprehensions with:
“It will be good when I am dying,
It is good enough for me.”
But Grover Cleveland wasn’t ready to go home yet and, tugging at
Arsula’s skirt, he piped timorously:
“It will be good while I’m a-livin,”—probably it was only dislike of
the thought of dying that inspired his improvisation, but Arsula and
the rest took it up with all their heart:
“It will be good while I am living,
It is good enough for me.”
Transcriber’s Notes
pg 72 Changed: an “understanding,” existed betwen
to: an “understanding,” existed between
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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