Benefits Forgot | Page 2

salary was small, even for a Methodist circuit rider, in the decade before the Civil War. It was smaller by fifty dollars than what they had been allowed the year before. Yet, High Hill, as Mrs. Wilkins pointed out to Jason the next day, was much more attractive than any town they had been in for years. There was a good school, and the Ohio river-packet stopped twice a week, and a Mr. Inchpin in the town was reported to be the owner of a number of books. Jason's mother was an Eastern woman and sometimes the loneliness and hardship of her life made her find solace in what seemed to Jason inconsequential things. Still, he was glad of the school, for he was a first-class student and already had decided to take his father's and mother's advice that he study medicine. And the packet, warping in twice a week, was, after all, something to which one might look forward and Mr. Inchpin's books would be wonderful.
Jason was sure that the Ohio valley in which he had spent the whole of his short life was the most beautiful spot in the world. The lovely green heights rolling back into the Kentucky sky line, were, he thought, great enough for David, whose cattle fed upon a thousand hills. The fine headlands on the Ohio side, wooded, mysterious, were, he was sure, clad in verdure like the utmost bound of the everlasting hills of Jacob. And High Hill with its fifteen hundred souls was "a city, builded on a hill that could not be laid."
For Jason was brought up on the Bible. His father believed that it ought to be, outside of his school text books, his only literature. His mother, with her Eastern traditions, thought otherwise. A Methodist circuit rider before the Civil War moved every year, and every year Mrs. Wilkins combed each new community for books. It was wonderful how she and Jason scented them out.
They had been in High Hill about a week when Jason came panting into the house late one afternoon. His father was writing a sermon in the sitting room. Jason tip-toed into the kitchen, where his mother was preparing supper.
"The packet's in, mother, and I carried a man's carpet bag up to the hotel and look--what he gave me!"
His slender boyish brown hands fairly trembled as he held a torn and soiled magazine toward his mother. She dropped the biscuit she was molding and seized it.
"Harper's Monthly! O Jason dear, how wonderful! You shall read it aloud to me after supper."
"It's prayer meeting night," said Jason in a sick voice.
His mother flushed a little. "So it is! My goodness, Jason! Print makes a heathen of me and you're most as bad. You haven't fed the horse or milked."
"So I won't get a look at it till tomorrow," cried Jason, bitterly.
Mrs. Wilkins glanced toward the closed door that led into the sitting room. Then she looked at Jason's wide brown eyes, at the round-about she had cut over from his father's old sermon coat, at the darned stockings and the trousers that had belonged to the rich boy of the town they had lived in the year before.
"Jason," she said, "you ought to get plenty of sleep because you're a growing boy. But a thing like this won't happen for years again--and--well, I've saved up several candle ends, hoping to get some sewing done nights when your father was using the lamp. When you go up to bed tonight, take those and read your magazine."
"But you ought to keep them," protested Jason.
"Not at all," exclaimed his mother, vigorously, "it's all for your education. Run along now and milk."
So Jason reveled in his Harper's Monthly, and the next day as he wiped the dishes for his mother, he produced his great idea.
"If I can earn the money, this summer, mother, can I subscribe to Harper's Monthly for a year?"
"My goodness, Jason, it's five dollars and this is the first of August! School begins in a month."
"I know all that," replied Jason impatiently, "but if I earn the money can I have it for Harpers Monthly?"
"Of course you can. It's all for your education, my dear. I never forget that."
A money paying job for a boy of twelve was a hard thing to find in High Hill and Jason was late for supper that night. But his brown eyes were shining with triumph when he slid into his seat and held out his bowl for his evening meal of mush and milk.
"I've got a job," he said.
"A job?" queried his father. He smiled a little at Jason's mother.
"Yes, sir. Mr. Inchpin is having a new barn built on the hill back of his house. The brook runs at the foot of it and I'm going to haul