That's Sallie over there in that potato patch. She has been endeavoring
to tease from mother earth enough tubers to supply the family through a
long winter. Nature in this and many other instances has been unkind.
The rain waited too long and the one supply of food that fills so large
a place are small as marbles, nevertheless this dear soul laboriously
gathered them and is carrying them, pail at a time, and storing them
away for a long, cold winter. Though the tubers are small and puny, she
has a way of cooking them with such marked success that they would
tickle the palate of a king and he'd be passing his plate the second
time.
Sal does the housework, the buying of supplies, cares for the chickens,
plants the garden, does the sewing, picks up the paint brush when
necessary, and does about everything that anyone can do. She is past
fifty years of age, most of them hard and bitter years. They have not
been the kind of years where the goal has been worth the trials and
bitterness. The streaks of silver are beginning to show in her dark
hair, she is small in physique, clean limbed, lithe, resourceful,
determined, and intelligent. Her schooling in the practical side of life
is an attainment any one should be proud of. She is one of the most wiry
and courageous women that has ever lived such a grand and noble life and
kept the sad, dreary and lonely part locked up in her unselfish heart.
Behold her as she is, one of God's purest gifts! Her life is clean,
wholesome and grand and of such a sweetness and beauty that mocks to
scorn any imitation of the artist. For eight long years she has cared
uncomplainingly for the aged, widowed mother as her almost sole
benefactor of aid and cheer in the home. She has sacrificed, schemed,
planned, worked, and struggled in a way that is worthy of our greatest
financiers, diplomats, or statesmen. She has fought within her own heart
far greater battles and carried away the victory to a more deserving
reward than many a soldier on the battlefield. She has denied herself in
order that she might give the fullest measure of devotion to a dear old
mother who is slipping slowly, slowly to that great home of rest and
comfort.
God bless you, Sallie, in your old age, when the silver streaks no
longer glisten in your hair and it is all turned to the whiteness and
purity of snow; when your poor, tired aching limbs from their long years
of toil no longer yield to quick response, when time chisels its deep
furrows in your brow and your keen eye loses its lustre and grows dim. I
hope God will reward you with the choicest gifts of his kingdom, and
when the final summons is made and you stand in the open doorway of his
love, bathed in the purity of the sparkling dew in the evening time of
life, may the sweetness of your character come wafting gently in the
fulness of its beauty and dwell amidst all that is holy, sweet and
sacred.
Dearest Sal, you're growing old,
But there never can be told,
The great jewels you possess,
In your life of righteousness.
I would love you just the same,
Had you reached the highest fame,
For you have a heart so true,
There would be no change in you.
You have done all duties well,
Better than my tongue can tell,
I would love to ease your way,
And turn your winters back to May.
I have but one life to live,
But for you I'd freely give,
I'd go down that lonesome valley,
If 'twould help you, dear old Sallie.