Sketch LXXI

When Grandmother Slaght was a Girl

It was about seventy-five years ago when Sarah Corliss was a girl. At that time she was one of the smartest and best-looking girls in the Boston settlement. More than one young fellow, with a coon-skin cap and a brand-new hickory shirt, tried to get around the “old man,” but Swain Corliss[1] was not to be “got around” by every young log-roller that came along, whether he belonged to the home settlement or came from Turkey Point, or any other centres of Long Point refinement. He did not bring up his girls in the dense woods and on the rich, sticky soil of old Townsend, to be carried off by fellows who were not “all wool and a yard wide.” He had whittled out a home in the rough, and he knew that the youngsters who were “shinin” around his comely daughters would have to do likewise if they ever had homes of their own; and he had learned from the hard school of experience what kind of pluck a young fellow must possess, and what sort of stuff he must be made of to accomplish this task. He knew that his girls were duly qualified and abundantly able to perform their share of the labor in the work of home-building, and he determined not to accept any one as a son-in-law who was unworthy. This was all right if the standard had not been raised too high. To compare the average young man of the settlement with his own girls in all matters pertaining to individual worth or moral excellence, was to place the young men at a very great disadvantage in their endeavors to win the over-watchful father’s approval.

“Love goes where it is sent” was a philosophical old saying in our good old grandmothers’ days, and one that they religiously believed in; and so Sarah Corliss fell in love with Job Slaght. It was in the days of bows and arrows, and Cupid, no doubt, was a better marksman at that time than he is nowadays. In those days Cupid was looked upon as a veritable tyrant. His darts were shot off arbitrarily without the least preconsideration as to matters of adaptability, marriage endowments, “compatibility of temper” or worldly prospects; and the invincible little missiles always “went where they were sent.” Job Slaght was not “all wool” according to the standard of inspection adopted by Mr. Corliss, and so, when Sarah fell in love with him, the paternal head of the Corliss log-house raised a strong and vigorous objection. He told her she would lower the dignity of the house of Corliss if she married Job Slaght, and that if she persisted in her unwise course he would be compelled to put down his cow-hide boot squarely and firmly, and nip the whole business in the bud. Was the bud nipped? Sarah Corliss is within a few months of her 91st milestone in the journey of life, and as she can tell the story as well to-day as she could seventy years ago, we will let her tell it herself:

“I never openly and wilfully disobeyed my father but once in my life, and that was when I got married. Father didn’t like Job and he didn’t want me to marry him. But you see I’d promised Job, and I had to either disobey father or break my word and honor with the man I loved and wanted to marry. Put any girl in a place like that, and if she is conscious of having a heart—and she would be if it wasn’t calloused all over with the evil effects of a vain, trifling, idle life—she would be guided by its pulsations and the dictations of her own conscience rather than the cold business-like advice of a father, however kind and affectionate he might be. Job and I had to run away to get married. He hired a man to take us down to Squire Bowlby’s in the night in his lumber wagon. Nowadays the girls go away in a covered buggy, or in the cars, when they cut up a caper of this kind. Well, the Squire married us, and on our way back we met father, who passed us without sayin’ a word. When he got down to Waterford the tavern-keeper told him that we were lawfully married, and that the only thing he could do about it was to go home, make the best of it and get up a nice little “infare.” Father didn’t give us the “infare” or get over it till he saw that Job and I were gettin’ along all right. We stayed at a neighbor’s that night, and the next day we took possession of our home. My, what a place it was! Job’s mother had been dead about eight years, and the old man had let everything go to rack an’ ruin. The land had been cropped by the neighbors in any way to suit themselves, and even the fences had been carried off. Job was handy with tools, and he had been away from home workin’ for himself. In the old log-house there were three old rickety, broken-down chairs, and an old square table. Well, the first thing Job did was to buy six cups and saucers, six plates, six knives and forks and a tea-pot. A bedstead was made by fitting small poles into auger-holes bored into the logs. These poles were about six feet long, and were small enough to have a good spring. The lower ends of these spring poles lay on a cross piece, one end of which was inserted in an auger-hole in the wall and the other supported by an upright. Job got a feather bed and some bedding from a man who owed him for work done, and being a carpenter he soon got things in a livable shape. In the barn there was a quantity of flax which had been grown before everything had gone to rack, and as soon as we got things righted up abit in the house, Job went out to work and I pitched into that flax. Job broke it for me and then I took off the shives, hetcheled it, takin’ out the tow, which was carded and spun on the big wheel like wool, and which furnished the fillin’ in weavin’ the coarser cloth used for towelling, tickin’, bagging, etc. The flax was spun on the little wheel. We were married in October, and during the winter I made up forty-three yards of cloth out of that flax, and this gave us a supply of table cloths, towels, sheets, tickin’, bags, etc.; and while I was thus engaged, Job worked around for wheat and pork, and when not employed in this way, improved the time in makin’ me a wash-tub, a little churn and two or three pails. In the spring Job bought a cow, and the busy work of life began. God in His mercy smiled on our efforts, and we prospered; but, my, my! How quickly it has all passed away. It seems only night before last that I climbed into that lumber wagon and bumped along over the corduroy by the side of Job, on our way to Squire Bowlby’s, and yet many years have come and gone since Job’s life work was ended, while I am passed ninety. Yes, tell the story to the young, and if it will inspire them with renewed courage in fighting the battles of life, or lead them to a keener realization of the rapid flight of time, you will be doing a good work.”

Job Slaght was a grandson of Job Slaght, one of the original pioneers of old Townsend, whose history is given elsewhere in this volume. The “original” Job Slaght had five sons—Henry, Job, John, Cornelius and Aaron; and three daughters—Elizabeth, Sarah and Mary.

Henry Slaght, the eldest of these sons, married Abigail Heminover, and settled about two miles north of Waterford, in the 5th concession of Townsend. They had two sons—Job and Parney; and two daughters—Elizabeth and Mary. Job, the elder of these two sons married Sarah Corliss, the subject of this sketch. He succeeded his father on the old homestead, but subsequently sold out and settled near Port Rowan, where he died.[2] His aged widow lives in Port Ryerse. They had two sons—Andrew and Philander; and three daughters—Caroline, Phoebe and Mary.

[1] On page 334 of his text, Owen stated that Sarah (Corlis) Slaght was a daughter of Uriah Corlis not Swain Corlis. Uriah was recorded living with Sarah Slaght in the 1861 Census of Charlotteville Twp.

[2] Job Slaght settled on Lot 5, Concession A, Charlotteville Twp. south of Forestville where he was recorded in the 1852 Census and in the 1867 Gazetteer of Norfolk County. His son Andrew was named on the lot in the 1877 Historical Atlas of Norfolk County. Both Job and his wife Sarah were buried in Hillcrest Cemetery at Forestville.