Jasper Street

by August Bell

Chapter I

When one lives for years upon years in the same neighborhood, and in the same house, there is no need of finding it monotonous; there are always changes occurring, events developing, and incidents happening in this little world of one street, always interesting, and sometimes absorbing. Our family have lived on Jasper street for twenty-five years, and the most of our neighbors have been long residents. All the dwellings on our side of the street are in a solid block, planned and built alike, and consisting of twelve houses; fine old houses with stone fronts, glass plots before them, themselves five stories high, and each has an observatory or cupola on the top. This block was built some thirty years ago by an ambitious man, as a speculation; it ruined him, but his successor has made money enough since then, renting these houses to wealthy families who pay high prices, are perfectly contented, and seldom care to remove. There are the Leroys next to us, then the Haliburtons, the Davies, and so on, all fine old families, as a general thing, to the end of the block, though there are a few among us whose merit lies only in their wealth, and not at all in their genealogical trees. The other side of the street is very much the same, and our neighborhood is quite a social one, we all visit each other, flatter each other, talk gossip in a dignified way, and can make up a delightful party at any time without sending a single invitation beyond Jasper street.

My Uncle Harvey has always lived four doors from us on the left, but a year ago he concluded to take his family to Europe for an indefinite period, to educate his boys there, and learn foreign manners and customs more thoroughly than the guide-books teach. At his departure he left his house in the hands of an agent to be let all furnished, if any unexceptionable family without small… Read More