BARNSTEAD REUNION. 305
The old gray school-house where we learned to read, Plodding through Webster's speller, page by page —
The wooden seats, recording many a deed Of famous jack-knife in that early age — The box-like desk where sat the whilom sage.
The meeting-house, with its wide pen-like pews —
Its quaint old pulpit, crimson-decked and high, Where good Priest George, once in three Sundays, rose
To preach the word of Life to you and I ;
How dignified his mien — how keen his eye !
Another view — a homestead, old and brown,
Far from the dusty road— down a long hill; Above its square, flat roof the elms bend down,
As if to guard it from all future ill —
The well-sweep by the door is standing still.
But where are now the aged forms we loved —
Whose hearty greetings met us at the door — Whose deeds and words are strangely interwove
In all the halo that our childhood wore?
Ah ! they will meet our longing eyes no more.
Yes, well to us may Barnstead's soil be dear.
For underneath her sods and drifted snow, We've laid to rest, with many a bitter tear,
As fond, true hearts as earth ean ever know.
Sweet be their sleep, secure from all life's woe!
God bless the old, loved town ! May no dark deed
E'er be connected with her cherished name! And may her future children well succeed
In winning honors that may raise her fame,
Keeping her record free from blot or stain !
��ADDRESS.
��BY GEORGE W. DREW.
When an artist wishes to put upon can- friend E. S. Nutter. It is well for us to
vas the scenery which is before him, he meet as we have this evening and gather
pencils in outline the figure he wishes to up the fragments of history of our native
represent. He can fill in the finer pen- town, as they lie scattered in the minds
cillings at his leisure. of her people.
I bring before you this evening simply It means something more than the
the outlines of a 6ketch— a picture unfin- passing of a social hour. There is much
ished. I have not the artist's hand, or in the sociability of the time, but there is
genius, to complete it. It is for you to a deeper feeling in our hearts. It calls
add the finer pencillings of personal ex- to mind the remembrances of home life
periences and reminiscences, and bring around the old hearth stone, and brings
out the picture as you would have it. out the picture anew, of the family circle.
This re-union of the former residents As we sit here this evening amid the glit-
of Barns£ead was a happy thought of our ter of gas lights, and the festivities of the
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