Thus it runs in decorous metre:--
"Dear husband, now my life is passed,
You have dearly loved me to the last.
Grieve not for me, but pity take
On my dear children for my sake."
But one sorrowing widower amended it, according to his wife's
direction, so that it bore a new and significant meaning. He was
charged to
"pity take
On my dear parent for my sake."
The lesson was patent. His mother-in-law had always lived with him, and
she was "difficult." Who knows how keenly the sick woman's mind ran on
the possibilities of reef and quicksand for the alien two left alone
without her guiding hand? So she set the warning of her love and fear
to be no more forgotten while she herself should be remembered.
The husband was a silent man. He said very little about his intentions;
performance was enough for him. Therefore it happened that his
"parent," adopted perforce, knew nothing about this public charge until
she came upon it, on her first Sunday visit, surveying the new glory of
the stone. The story goes that she stood before it, a square,
portentous figure in black alpaca and warlike mitts, and that she
uttered these irrevocable words:--
"Pity on _me_! Well, I guess he won't! I'll go to the poor-farm fust!"
And Monday morning, spite of his loyal dissuasions, she packed her
"blue chist," and drove off to a far-away cousin, who got her "nussin'"
to do.
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