Who Spoke Next

by Eliza Lee Cabot Follen

"Pray, dear mother, tell us what a rag bee is," said Harry.

"At the time when our tea-kettle was in its prime, we had no woollen or cotton factories in this country. Our carpets all came from Europe, from England most of them, and poor people could not afford to buy them. Families were in the habit of carefully saving all their woollen pieces, all their old woollen clothes; not a scrap was lost.

When a large quantity of these old woollen pieces was collected, it was a custom in the country to invite all the neighbors to come in, and aid the family in cutting these fragments up into narrow strips, about an eighth of an inch wide, and then sewing the strips together, and winding them up into large balls. This was used for what the weavers call the warp or the filling of the carpet. The woof was made of yarn, spun usually in the house from wool taken from the backs of their own sheep, and colored with a dye made from the roots of the barberry bushes, or the poke weed, with the aid of a little foreign indigo, or perhaps logwood. A sufficient variety of colors could be manufactured to produce a very decent-looking carpet.

The weaving of this homemade carpet was done also in the neighborhood. There were always looms enough to weave, for a moderate price, all the carpets required in the place. At that time, there was usually a carpet only in what was called the sitting room, or, as the country people called it, "the settin room." The rest of the house had bare floors; perhaps, in the houses of the richest of the country people, a bit of carpet by the bed side.

But I must tell you what else the tea-kettle said. "I went, or rather was carried," said she, "to the rag party. The good lady who borrowed me, I must say for her, did brighten me up famously. "There," said she, as she gave me the last touch with her rubbing cloth, "ef it ain't as bright as our Lijah's cheeks a Sabberday mornins!"

The country hour for dining was twelve o'clock, and the rag party was invited to come at two. Accordingly, all the women of the place with whom Mrs. Nutter had any acquaintance that did or did not authorize an invitation, were assembled in her best parlor, to take part in the rag bee.

A nice-looking, sensible set of folks they were, and, if I could remember all they said, I am sure you would think it very amusing. One of the subjects that I now think of was introduced by a pair of very old breeches.

"Where," said Mrs. White, "did you get such a pair of horrid, old, scrimpy, frightful things as them? Why, the knees are patched with blue, and the seats with red, and they are so very small, and yet so long—who did they belong to?"

Mrs. Nutter hesitated for a moment; at last, she seemed to muster courage, and to be determined to speak the whole truth.

"Well," said she, "ef I must tell the treuth, them are breeches come off of a scarecrow. It stands to reason that none of us could ever have worn 'em. This here's the way I got 'em. My husband bought Mr. Crane's piece that jined on to ourn, and I made him throw in the scarecrow, cause I meant to have a rag party; and I reckon that you'll get a good many strips out on 'em, though they be so patched like."