A CRANKY COUPLE.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XII, Issue 4, 16 May 1884, Page 19

A CRANKY COUPLE.

Canton, Ohio, Fab. 15. — An event of considerable importance has occurred in a little farm house a few miles from this city, within a few days. Mrs. Dewees spoke to her husband. This is what she said : " William, I believe I am dying." However, she did not die and she is now nearly well again. But the fact that she spoke at all to her husband has greatly excited those who are acquainted with the old couple. They are past three score. This is the first time either has spoken to the other for nearly a quarter of a century, though each has spoken to other persons daily all the while. Nearly twenty-five years ago Mrs. Dewees desired her husband to do some trifling thing which he regarded as either impossible or unwise, and he refused. She becoming petulant with disappointment, rashly exclaimed : " If yon don't I'll never speak to you again as long as I live." " I not only will not do it," he said aroused to anger, " but I will not speak to you until you speak first to me." The issues thus joined lasted longer than either imagined they would. Until the recent night ■, spoken of neither Mr. nor Mrs Dewees ever uttered a word to each other. The quarrel was soon over and the best of ' feeling was resumed between them. They have lived together ever since, contented and harmonious, the only cloud upon their happiness being their silence to each other. But even this had its advantages. When Mr. Dewees wanted to say anything to his wife he would cay for example to one of the children : " Jennie, tell your mother I wish she , would sew another button on my overalls." Or the mother would say: "John, tell your father to bring some sugar, oil, pepper, and a spool of thread. No. 60. from town to-day." At first it waß difficult for them to repress the impulse to speak to each other but being persons of strong will, they stuck doggedly to their resolutions until habit made it easy to do so. " Yes," said Mr. Dewees to a neighbour one day, " we have not spoken for pretty near twenty-five years. It has sometimes been a little inconvenient, and of course, it seems silly to most people ; but it has been a blessing to us in most ways. That one quarrel was our last. I know from my disposition and hers that, if we had kept on talking we shonld have kept on quarreling more or leBS. Possibly we'd have got worse, because we weie both pretty high-strung, and it might have gone so far that we'd have been divorced." On the nigkt when the silence was broken Mrs. Dewees had been ill for several days, and about 1 o'clock in the morning she awoke in great pain, and thought her end had come. In her agoDy she called to her husband : " William, I believe I am 'dying 1 " The old couple have been talkiug to each other ever since "