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Aunt Mary’s Preserving Kettle
by
Thus the conversation and the conjectures went round, while the subject of them sat in solitude and sadness in her own chamber. Finally, the minister said that he would call in and have some conversation with her on the next day, as he had no doubt that there was some trouble on her mind, and it might be in his power to relieve it.
Monday morning came at last, and Aunt Mary proceeded, though with but little interest in her occupation, to “do over” her preserves. She found them in a state that gave her little hope of being able to restore them to any thing like their original flavour. But the trial must be made, and so she filled her kettle as full as requisite of a particular kind, and hung it over a slow fire. This had hardly been done, when Hannah came in and said–
“As I live, Mrs. Pierce, there is the minister coming up the walk!”
And sure enough, on glancing out, she saw the minister almost at the door-step.
“Bless me!” she exclaimed, and then hurried into her little parlour, to await the knock of her unexpected visitor. At almost any other time, a call from the minister would have been delightful. But now, poor Aunt Mary felt that she would as soon have seen any one else.
The knock came in a moment, and, after a pause, the door was opened.
“How do you do, Aunt Mary? I am very glad to see you,” said the minister, extending his hand.
Aunt Mary looked troubled and confused; but she received him in the best way she could. Still her manner embarrassed them both. After a few leading observations, the minister at length said–
“You seem troubled, Aunt Mary. Can any thing that I might say relieve the pain of mind you evidently feel?”
The tears came into Aunt Mary’s eyes, but she could not venture to reply. The minister observed her emotion, and also the meek expression of her countenance.
“Do not vex yourself unnecessarily,” he remarked. “If any thing has gone wrong with you, deal frankly with your minister. You know that I am ever ready to counsel and advise.”
“I know it,” said Aunt Mary, and her voice trembled. “And I need much your kind direction. Yet I hardly know how to tell you my troubles. One thing, however, is certain. I have done wrong. But how to mend that wrong I know not, while there exists an unwillingness on my part to correct it.”
“You must shun evil as sin,” the minister remarked in a serious tone.
“I know, and it is for that reason I am troubled. I have unkind thoughts, and they are evil, and yet I cannot put these unkind thoughts away.”
For a moment the minister sat silent, and then, looking up with a smile, said–
“Come, Aunt Mary, be open and frank. Tell me all the particulars of your troubles, and then I am sure I can help you.”
Aunt Mary, in turn, sat silent and thoughtful for a short period, and then, raising her head, she proceeded to relate her troubles. She told him how much she had been tried, year after year, during the preserving season, by the neighbours who had borrowed her preserving kettle. It was the best in the village, and she took a pride in it, but she could have no satisfaction in its possession. It was always going, and never returned in good order. She then frankly related how she had been tried by Mrs. Tompkins, and how nearly all of her preserves were spoiled, because she could not get home her kettle,–how the unkind feelings which had suddenly sprung up between them in consequence had troubled her, and even caused her to abstain, under conscientious scruples, from the communion.
The minister’s heart felt lighter in his bosom as she concluded her simple narrative, and, smiling encouragingly, he said–“Don’t let it trouble you, Aunt Mary; it will all come right again. You have certainly been treated very badly, and I don’t wonder at all that your feelings were tried.”