New York dispatch. [volume], March 07, 1886, Page 7, Image 7

About New York dispatch. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1863-1899

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PLUCK AND PRAYER.
There wa’n't any nse o’ fretting,
And I told Obadiah jo,
Tor if wo couldn't hold on to thingi
Wo’d jet t got to let them go.
There were 10.-a of folks that’d suffer
Along with the rest of us,
And it didn’t seem to be worth our while
To make such a dreffle Hiss.
. Tut, laws, if you’d only heard him
At any hour of the night,
A prayin’ out in that co et there,
’Twould have set you crazy quite.
I patched the knees of those trousers
With cloth that was no ways thin,
Bnt it seemed as if the pieces wore out
As fast as I set ’em in.
To me ho said mighty little
Of the thorny way we trod,
But at least a dozen times a day
He talked it over with God,
Down on his knees in that closet
The most of his time was passed :
For Obadiah knew how to pray,
Much better than how to fast.
But I am that way contrary
That if things don t go just right,
I feel like rollin’ my sleeves up high,
An’ getting ready to fight.
An’ the giants I slew that winter
I a'n't goin’ to talk about;
An’ I didn’t even complain to God,
/Though I think he tound it out.
“With the point of a cambric needle
I druv’ the wolf from the door.
For I knew that we needn’t starve to death
. Or be lazy because we were poor.
An’Obadiah he wondered
What kept me patchin’ his knees.
-An’ thought it strange bow the meal held out
An’ stranger we didn’t freeze.
But I said to myself in whispers,
•‘God knows where his gilt descends ;**
An’ 'tisn’t always that faith gets down
As far as the finger ends ;
An* I would not have no one reckon
My Obadiah a shire ;
For some, you know, have the gift to pray.
An* others the gift to work.
“OURJOJOR.”
A Story of Strange Experiences.
“But to-morrow—to-morrow you will keep
for me. I may expect yon at the usual time?’’
eaid young Mrs. Medway to her old friend Ma
jor Graham, as she shook hands with him.
“ To-morrow 1 Certainly, I have kept it for
you, Anne. I always said I should,” he an
swered. There was a slight touch of reproach
in his tone.
She lifted her eyes for half a second to his
face as if she would have said more. But alter
all it was only the words, “ Good-by, then, till
to-morrow,” that were uttered, quietly and al
most coldly, as Major Graham Left the room.
“ I can’t’quite make Anne out sometimes,” he
said to himself. “ She is surely very cold. And
yet 1 know she has real affection for mo—sister
ly affection, I suppose. Ah, well I so much the
better. But still, just when a fellow’s off for
Heaven knows how long—and—and altogether
it does seem a little overstrained. She can’t but
know what might have come to pass had we not
been separated for so long—or had I been richer
—and I don’t think she could have been exactly
In love with Medway, though by all accounts ho
was a very decent fellow. She is so inconsist
ent, too-sbe seemed really disappointed when
I said I couldn’t stay to-day. But I’m a fool to
think so much about her. lam as poor as ever,
and she is rich. A fatal barrier 1 It’s a good
thing that she is cold and that I have plenty of
other matters to think about.”
And thus congratulating himselfhe dismissed,
or believed that he had dismissed, for the
time being all thought of Anne Medway from
his mind. It was true that he had plenty
of other things to occupy it with, ior the day
after to-morrow was to see his departure from
England for an idetinite period.
Mrs. Medway meantime sat sadly and silsntly
in the library where Major Graham bad left her.
Her sweet gray eyes were fixed on the fire burn
ing brightly and cheerful in the waning after
noon light—but she saw nothing about her. Her
thoughts were busily traveling along a road
which had grown very familiar to them of late
—she was recalling all her past intercourse with
Kenneth Graham since the time when, as boy
and girl, they had scarcely remembered that
they were not “real” brother and sister 1 all
through the pleasant years of frequent meeting
end unconstrained companionship to the melan
choly day when Kenneth was ordered to India
and they bade each other a long farewell. That
was ten years ago now, and they had not met
again till last Spring, when Major Graham re
turned to find his old playmate a widow, young,
rich and lovely, but lonely in a sense—save that
she had two children—for she was without near
relations, and was not the type of woman to
make quick or numerous friendships. The re
newal of the old relations bad been very pleas
ant-only too pleasant, Anne had of late begun
to think. For the news pl Kenneth's having de
cided to go abroad again had made her realize
all he had become to her, and the discovery
brought with it sharp misgivings and even hu
miliation.
“Ho does not care for mo—not as Ido for
him,” she was saying to herself as she sat by
the fire. “There would haVe been no neces’-
sity for his leaving England again had ho done
so. It cannot be that lam rich and ho poor,
surely ? He is not the sort of man to let such a
mere accident as that stand in the way if he real
ly eared for me. No, it is that he does not care
ior me except as a sort of sister. But still—he
said he had kept hie last evening for me—at
least he cares ior no one else more, and that is
something. Who knows—perhaps to-morrow—
when it comes to really saying good-by !” and
a faint flush of renewed hope rose to her
cheeks and a brighter gleam to her eyes.
The door opened and a gray-haired man-ser
vant came in gently.
“ I beg your pardon, ma’am,” he said, apolo
getically ; “ I was not sure it Major Graham
had gone. Will he be here to dinner, it. you
please?”
• Not to-night, Ambrose. 1 shall be quite
.alone. But Major Graham will dine here to
morrow—he does not leave till Thursday morn
ing.”
“ Very well, ma’am,” said Ambrose, as he dis
creetly retired.
He had been many years in the Medway
-household. He had respected his late master,
but for bis young mistress he had actual affec
tion, and, being of a somewhat sentimental
turn, he had constructed for her benefit a very
pretty little romance of which Major Graham
was the her<s7 It had been a real blow to poor
Ambrose to learn that the gentleman in ques
tion was on the eve of his departure without
any sign of a satisfactory third’volume, and he
was rather surprised to see that Mrs. Medway
seemed this evening in better spirits than for
some time past.
“It’s may be understood between them
<selves,” he reflected, as he made his way back
to his own quarters. “1 am sure I hope so,
for he’s a real gentleman and she’s as sweet a
lady as ever stepped, which I should know if
any one should—having seen her patience with
poor master, as was really called for through
ms long illness. She deserves a happy ending,
and I’m sure I hope she may have it, poor
lady.”
“To-morrow, at the usual time,” meaning
five o’clock or thereabout, brought Kenneth
for his last visit. Anne had been expecting him
with an anxiety she was almost ashamed to own
to herself, yet her manner was so calm and
collected that no one conld have guessed the
tumult of hope and fear, of wild grief at his
leaving, of intense longing for any word—were
it but a word—to prove that all was not on her
-side only.
“ I could bear his being away—for years even,
it he thought it must be—if I could but look
forward—if 1 had the right to look forward to
his return,” she said to herself.
But the evening; passed on tranquilly, with
out a word or look more than might have been
between real brother and sister. Kenneth
talked kindly—tenderly even—of the past; re
peated more than once the pleasure it had been
to him to find again his old friend so little
-changed, so completely his old friend still.
The boys came in to say good night, and
“ Good by, alas 1 my lade,” added their tall
friend with a sigh. “Don’t forget me quite,
Hal and Charlie, and don’t let your mother
forget me either, eh ?” To which the little fel
lows replied, solemnly, though hardly under
standing why he patted their curly beads with
lingering hand this evening, or why mamma
looked grave at his words.
And Anne bore it without flinching, and
smiled and talked a little more than usual,
perhaps, though all the time her heart was
bursting, and Kenneth wondered more than
ever if, alter all, she had “ much heart or feel
■ing to speak of.”
“ You will be bringing back a wife with you,
perhaps,” she said once. “ Shall you tell her
about your sister Anne, Kenneth ?”
Major Graham looked at her earnestly for
half an instant before he replied, but Anne’s
eyes were not turned toward him, and she did
mot see the look. And his words almost be
liedit.
“ Certainly, I shall tell her of you,” he said ;
•“that is to say, if she ever comes to exist. At
present, tew things are less probable. Still I
am old enough now never to say, • Fontaine, je
ne boiral jamais de ton eau.’ But,” he went on,
“ I may return to find you married again, Anne.
You are still so young, and you are rather
lonely.”
“ No,” said Anne, with a sudden fierceness
which he had never seen in her before, “ I
shall never marry again—never,” and she
looked him lull in the face with a strange
sparkle in her eyes which almost frightened
him.
“ I beg your pardon,” he said, meekly. And
though the momentary excitement faded as
quickly as it had come, and Anne, murmuring
some half intelligible excuse, was again her
quiet self, this momentary glimpse of a fierier
nature beneath gave him food for reflection.
“ Can Medway have not been what he seemed
on the surface, alter all?” he thought to him
self. “ What can make her so vindictice against
matrimony ?”
But it was growing late, and Kenneth had
still some last preparations to make. He rose
slowly and reluctantly from his chair.
“I must be going, I fear,” he said.
Anne, too, had risen. They stood together
on the hearthrug. A slight, very slight shiver
passed through her. Kenneth perceived it
“You have caught cold, I fear,” he said
kindly. For tho room was warm and the fire
was burning brightly.
“ No, I don’t think BO,” she said, iudiffer-
“ Yon will writ© to me now and then ?” ho
said next. „ .
“Oh, certainly—not very often, perhaps. She
replied, lightly; “but now and then. Stay,
and she turned away toward her writing-table,
“ tell me exactly how to address you. Tour
name-is your surname enough ?—there is no
Other Graham in your regiment?”
“No,” he said, absently, “I suppose not.
Yes, just my name and the regiment, and Alla
gherry, which will be our headquarters. iou
might, if you were very amiable—you juignt
writes to Galles—a letter overland would wait
for me there,” for it was the days of “ long sea
for all troops to India. . .
Anne returned to her former position on the
hearthrug—the moment at the table had re
stored her courage.
“ We shall see,” she said, smiling again.
Then Kenneth said once more, “I must go,
but he lingered still a moment.
“ You must have caught cold, Anne, or else
you are very tired. You are so white.”
And from h.s hight above her, though Anne
herself was tall, he laid his hand on her shoul
der gently, and as a brother might have done,
and looked down at her pale face half inquir
ingly. A Hush of color rose tor an instant to
her cheeks. The temptation was strong upon
her to throw off that calmly caressing hand,
but she resisted it, and looked up bravely with
a light almost of defiance in her eyes.
“1 am perfectly well, I assure you. But per
haps lam a little tired. I suppose it is getting
late.”
And Kenneth stifled a sigh ot scarcely real
ized disappointment, and quickly drew back
his hand.
“ Yes, it is late. I am very thoughtless.
Good-by, then, Anno. God b’less you I”
And before she had time to answer he was
gone. »
Ambrose met him in the hall, with well-mean
ing ofliciousness bringing forward his coat and
hat. Hia presence helped to dissipate an im
pulse which seized Major Graham to rush up
stairs again for one other word of farewell.
Had he done so, what would he have found ?
Anne sotibing—with the terrible intensity of a
self-contained nature once the strain is with
drawn—sobbing in the bitterness of her grief
and the cruelty of Iwr mortification, with but
one consolation.
“At least he does not despise me. I hid it
well,” she whispered, to herself.
And Kenneth he drove away in
his cab, repeated to himself.
“ She is so cold, this evening particularly.
And, yet, can it be, that it was to hide any other
feeling? If I thought so—good Godl’ and ho half
started up aa if to call to the driver, but he sat
down again. “ No, no, I must not be a fool. I
could not stand a repulse from her—l could
never see her again. Better not risk it. And
then I am so poor 1”
And in the bustle and hurry of his departure
he tried to forget the wild fancy which, for a
moment, had disturbed him. He sailed the
next day.
But the few weeks which followed passed
heavily for Anne. It was a dead time ot the
year—there was no special necessity for .her
exerting herself to throw off the overwhelming
depression, and strong and brave as she was,
she allowed herself to some extent to yield to it.
“If only ho had not come back—if I had
never seen him again 1” she repeated to herself,
incessantly. “ I had in a sense forgotten him—
the thought of him never troubled me all the
years ot my marriage. I suppose I had never
before understood it. How I wish he had never
come back 1”
It was, above all, in the afternoons—the dull,
early dark, Autumn afternoons, which for some
weeks had been enlivened by the expectation,
sure two or three times a week to be fulfilled,
of Major Graham’s “dropping in”—that the
aching pain, the weary longing grew so bad as
to be well nigh intolerable.
“How shall I bear it?” said poor Anne to
herself, sometimes. “It is so wrong, so un
womanly 1 So selfish, too, when I think of my
children. How much I have to be thankful for
— why should I ruin my life by crying for the
one thing that is not for me? It is worse—far
worse than if he had died. Had 1 known that
he had loved me, I could have borne his death,
it seems to me.”
She was sitting alone one afternoon about
five weeks after Kenneth had left, thinking sad
ly over and over the same thoughts, when a
tap at the door macle her look up.
“ Come in,” she said, though the tap hardly
sounded like that ot her maid, and no one else
was likely to come to the door of her own room,
where she happened to be—“ come in.” And,
somewhat to her surprise, the door half opened
and old Ambrose’s voice replied:
“If you please, ma’am ” then stopped and
hesitated.
“ Come in,” she repeated, with a touch of im
patience. “What is it, Ambrose ? Where is
Seton ?”
“If you please, ma’am, 1 couldn’t And her--
“ that is to say,” Ambrose went on nervously,
“I didn’t look for her. I thought, ma’am, I
would rather tell you myself. You mustn’t be
startlbd, ma’am/’and Anne, at this, looking up
at the old man, saw that he was pale and
startled-looking himself, “ but it’s— it’s Ma,or
Graham.”
“ Major Graham !” repeated Anne, and to
herself her voice sounded almost like a scream.
“ What about him ? Have you heard any
thing ?”.
“it’s him, ma’am—him himself,” said Am
brose. “ He’s in the library. I’m a little
airaid, ma’am, there may be something wrong,
he looked so strange, and ho did not answer
when 1 spoke to him. But he’s in the library,
ma’am.”
Anne did not wait to hear more. She rushed
past Ambrose, across the landing, and down
the two flights of steps that led to the library—
a half-way-house room between the ground
floor and the drawing-room—almost before his
voice had stopped.
At the door she hesitated a moment, and in
that moment all sorts of wild suppositions
flashed across her brain. What was it ? What
was she going to hear ? Had Kenneth turned
back half way out to India for her sake ? Had
some trouble befallen him, in which he had
come to seek her sympathy? What oould it
be ? And her heart beating so as almost to suf
focate her, she opened the door.
Yes, there he stood—on the hearth rug, as
she had last seen him in that room. But he did
not seem to hear her come in, for he did not
even turn his head in her direction.
More and more startled and perturbed, Anne
hastily went up to him.
“ Kenneth,” sue cried, “ what is it ? What is
the matter
She had held out her hand as she hurried to
ward him, but he did not seem to see it. Ho
stood there still; without moving, his face
slightly turned away, till she was close beside
him.
“ Kenneth,” she repeated, this time with a
thrill of something very like anguish in her
tone, “w-hat is tho matter? Are you angry
with mo? Kenneth, speak I”
Then at last be slowly turned his head and
looked at her with a strange, half wistful anxie
ty in his eyes; he gazed at her as if his very soul
were in that gaze, and lifting his right hand,
gently laid it on her shoulder as he had done
the evening he had bidden her farewell. She
did not shrink from his touch, but, strange to
say, she did not feel it, and some indefinable in
stinct made her turn her eyes away from his
and glance at her shoulder. But even as she
did so, she saw that his hand was no longer
there, and with a thrill of fear she exclaimed
again:
“ Speak, Kenneth, speak to me 1”
The words fell on empty ah’. There was no
Kenneth beside her. She*was standing on the
hearthrug alone.
Then, for the first time there came over her
that awful chill of terror so often described,
yet so indescribable to all but the few who have
felt it for themselves. With a terrible though
half-stifled cry Anne turned toward the door.
It opened before she reached it, and she fell in
to old Ambrose’s.arms. Fortunately for her—
for her reason perhaps—his vague "misgiving
had made him follow her, though of what he
was afraid he could scarcely have told.
“ Oh, ma’am—oh, my poor lady !” he exclaim
ed, as he half led, hall carried her back to her
own room, “what is it? Has he gone? But
how could behave gone? I was close by—l
never saw him pass.”
“He is not there—he has not been there,” said
poor Anne, trembling and clinging to her old
servant. “ Oh, Ambrose, what you and I have
seen was no living Kenneth Graham—no living
man at all. Ambrose—he came to say good-by
to me. He is dead,” and tears burst forth as
she spoke, and Anno sobbed convulsively.
Ambrose looked at her in distress and con
sternation past words. Then at last he found
courage to speak.
“My poor lady,” he repeated, •• it must be
so. I misdoubted me and I did not know why.
He did not ring, but I was passing by the door
and something, a sort of feeling that there was
some one waiting outside, made me open it To
my astonishment it was he,” and Ambrose him
self could not repress a sort of tremor. “He
did not speak, but seemed to pass me and be
up the stairs and in the library in an instant.
And then, not knowing what to do, I went to
your room, ma’am. Forgive me if I did
wrong.”
“ No, no,” said Anne, “ you could not have
done otherwise. Ring the bell, Ambrose, tell
Seton I have had bad news, and that you think
it has upset me. But wait at the door till she
comes. I—l am afraid to be left alone.”
And Mrs. Medway looked so deadly pale and
faint that when Seton came hurrying in answer
to the sharply rung bell, it needed no explana
tion for her to see that Mrs. Medway was really
ill. Seton was a practical, matter-of-fact per
son, and the bustle ot attending to her mistress,
trying to ,make her warm again—for Anne was
shivering with cold—and persuading her to
take some restoratives, effectually drove any
inquiry as to the cause of the sudden seizure
out of the maid’s head. And by the time Mrs.
Medway was better Seton had invented a satis
factory explanation of it all forbheraelf.
“ You need a change,
for anybody staying in town at this season, and
it’s beginning to tell on your nerves, ma am,”
was the maid’s idea.
And some little time after the strange occur
rence Mrs. Medway was persuaded to leave
town for the country.
But not until she had seen in the newspapers
the fatal paragraph she knew would sooner or
later be there—the announcement of the death,
on board her majesty's troopship “Ariadne,” a
few days before reaching the Cape, of “ Maior
It. R. Graham,” of the One Hundred and Thir
teenth Regiment-.
She “ had known it,” she said to herself, yet
when she saw it there, staring her in the face,
she realized that she had been living in a hope
which she had not allowed to herself, that the
apparition might iu the end prove capable of
NEW YORK DISPATCH. MARCH 7, 1886.
other explanation. She would gladly have i
taken re uge in the thought that it was a dream, i
nn optical delusion fed of her fancy incessantly
brooding on her friend and on his last visit—
that her brain was in some way disarranged or
disturbed - anything, anything wobld have been
welcome to her. But against all such was op
posed the fact that it was not herself alone who
had seen Kenneth Graham that fatal afternoon.
And now, when the worst was certain, she
recognized this still more clearly as the atrong
est testimony to the apparition not having been
the product of her own imagination. And old
Ambrose, her solo confidant, in his simple way,
agreed with her.
“If I had not seen him, too, ma’am, or if I
alone had seen him,” he said, furtively wiping
his eyes. “But the two of us. No, it could
have but one meaning,” and be looked sadly at
the newspaper. “ There’s a slight discrimpan
cy, ma’am,” he said as he pointed to the para
graph ; “our Major Graham s name was ‘K.
R.,’ not Z?. R.’ ”
“It is only a misprint. I noticed that,” said
Anne, wearily. “ No, Ambrose, there can be
no mistake. But I do not want any one —not
any one—ever to hear the story. You will prom
ise me that, Ambrose?” and the old man re
peated the promise he had already given.
There was another “ discrimpancy,” which
had struck Anne more forcibly, but which she
refrained from mentioning to Ambrose.
“ It can mean nothing ; it is no use putting it
into his head,” she said to herself. “Still, it is
strange.”
Tho facts were these: The newspaper gave
the date of Major Graham’s death as the 25th of
November—the afternoon on which he had ap
peared to Mrs. Medway and her servant was
that of the 26th. This left noipossibility of cal
culating that the vision had occurred at or even
shortly after the moment of the death.
“ It must be a mistake fn the announcement,”
Anne decided.
And then she gave herself up to the accept
ance of the fact. Kenneth was dead. Lite held
no individual future for her any more, nothing
to look forward to, no hopes, however trem
blingly admitted, that “some day” he might re
turn, and return to discover—to own, perhaps,
to himself and to her that he did love her, and
that only mistaken pride, or her own coldness,
or one of the hundred “mistakes’ or “per
hapses” by which men, so much more than
women, allow to drift away from them the hap
piness they might grasp, had misled and with
held him! No: all was over. Hence orth she
must live in her children alone—in the interests
of others she must find her happiness.
“And in one blessed thought,” said the poor
girl—lor she was little more—even at the first to
herself, “ that alter all he did love me, that I
may, without shame, say so in my heart, for I
was his last thought. It was—it must have
been—to tell me so that he came that day. My
Kenneth—yes, he was mine alter all.”
Some little time passed. In the quiet country
place whither, sorely against Seton's desires.
Mrs. Medway had betaken herself for “change,”
she heard no mention of Major Graham’s death.
One or two friends casually alluded to it in the r
letters as “ very sad,” but that was all. And
Anne was glad of it.
“ I must brace myself to hear it spoken of and
discussed by the friends who knew him well—
who knew how well I knew him,” she reflected.
“But 1 am glad to escape it for a while.”
It was February already—more than three
months s nee Kenneth Raymond had left Eng
land—when one morning, among letters for
warded to her London address, came a thin for
eign paper one, with the traces of travel upon
it, of which the superscription made Anne start
and then turn pale and cold.
“ I did not think of this,” she said to herself.
“He must have left it to be forwarded to me.
It is terrible—getting a letter alter tho hand that
wrote it has been long dead and cold.”
With trembling fingers she o.ncned it.
“My dear—may I say my dearest? —Anne,”
were the first words that her eyes fell on. Her
own filled with tears. Wiping them away be
fore going on to read more, she caught sight of
the date: “On board H. M.’s troop ship Ariadne,
Nov. 27.”
Anne started. Stranger and stranger. Two
days later than the reported date of his death—
and the writing so strong and clear. No sign
of weakness or illness even I She read on with
frantic eagerness—it was not a very long letter
—but when Anne had read the two or three
somewhat hurriedly-written pages, her face had
changed as if from care-worn, pallid middle
age back to fresh, sunny youth. She fell on her
knees in fervent, unspoken thanksgiving. She
kissed the letter—the dear, beautiful letter, as
if it were a Hying thing 1
“It is too much—too much,” she said.
“What have I done to deserve such blessed
ness?”
This was what the letter told. The officer
whose death had been announced was not “our
Major Graham ;” not Graham of the One Hun
dred and Thirteenth at all, but an officer be
longing to another regiment who had come on
board at Madeira to return to India, believing
his health to be quite restored.
“ The doctors had in some way mistaken his
case,” wrote Kenneth, “ for he broke down
again quite suddenly, and died two days ago.
He was a very good fellow, and we have all
boon very cut up about it. He took a fancy
to me, and I have been up some nights with
him, and lam rather done up myself. I write
this to post at the Capo, for a fear has struck
me that his initials being so like mine—some
report may reach you that it is I, not ho.
Would you care very much, dear Anne ? I dare
to think you would -but I cannot in a letter toll
you why. I must wait till I see you. 1 have
had a somewhat strange experience, and it is
possible—just possible—that I may bo able to
tell you about it (viva voce) sooner that I
had any idea of when I last saw you. In the
meantime good-by, and God bless you, my
dear child.”
Then followed a postscript—of some days’
later date, written in great perturbation of spirit
at finding that the letter had, by mistake, not
been posted at the Cape :
“After all my anxiety that you should see it
as soon as or before tho newspapers, it is really
too bad. I cannot understand how it happened.
I suppose it was that I was so busy getting poor
Graham's papers and things together to send
on shore that I overlooked it. It cannot now
be posted till wo get to Galles.”
That was all. But was it not enough and
more than enough ? Tho next few weeks
passed for Anne Medway like a happy dream.
Who was content now to wait—years even—she
had recovered faith in herself—faith in the
future.
The next Indian mail brought her no letter,
somewhat to her surprise. She had wondered
what had made Kenneth allude to his perhaps
seeing her again before long—she wondered al
most m< re what was the “ strange experience”
to which he referred. Could it have had any
connection with her most strange experience
that November afternoon ? And thus “ won
dering” she was sitting alone—in her own bouse
again by this time—one evening toward the end
ol April, when a ring of the bell made her look
up from the book she was reading, hall dreamily
asking herself what visitor could be coming so
late. She heard steps and voices-a door shut
ting, then Ambrose opened that of the drawing
room where she was sitting and came up to her
his wrinkled old face all flushed and beaming.
“ It was me that frightened you so that day,
ma’am,” he began. “ It’s right it should be me
again. But it’s himself—his own very self this
time. You may believe me, indeed.”
Anne started to her feet. She felt herself
growing pale—she trembled so that she could
scarcely stand.
“ Where is he?” she said. “ You have not put
him in the 1 brary—anywhere but there.”
“He would have it so, ma’am. He said he
would explain to you. Oh, go to him, ma’am
youTl see it’ll be all right.”
Anne made her way to the library. But at the
door a strange tremor seized her. She could
scarcely control herself to open it. Yes—there
again on the hearthrug stood the tall figure she
had so often pictured thus to herself. She
trembled, and all but fell, but his voice—his
own hearty, living voice—speaking to her in ac
cents tenderer and deeper than ever heretofore*
—reassured her and dispersed at once the fear
that had hovered about her.
“Anne, my dear Anne. It is I, mvself.
Don’t look so frightened,” and in a moment he
had led her forward, and stood with his hand
on her shoulder, looking with his kind, earnest
eyes into hers.
“ Yes,” he said, dreamily, “ it was just thus.
Oh, how often I have thought of this moment.
Anne, if I am mistaken, forgive my presump
tion—but I can’t think I am. Anne, my darling
you do love me ?”
There was no need of words. Anne hid her
face on hia shoulder lor one happy moment.
Then amid the tears that would come she told
him all—all she had suffered, and hoped, and
feared—her love, and her agony of humiliation
when she thought it was not returned; her ter
rible grief when she thought him dead—and yet
the consolation of believing herself to have been
his last thought in liie.
“So you shall be—my first and my last,” he
answered. “My Anne—my very own 1”
And then she told him more of the strange
story we know. He listened with intense eager
ness but without testifying much surprise, far
loss incredulity.
“ I anticipated something of the kind,” he
said, after a moment or two of silence. “It
is very strange. Listen, Anne; at the time, the
exact time so far as I can roughly calculate,
at which you thought you saw me, I was dream
ing of you. It was between four and five
o’clock in the afternoon, was it not ?”
Anne bowed her head in assent.
“ That would have made it about six o’clock
where we then were,” he went on consideringly.
“ Yea, it was about eeven when I awoke. I bad
lain down that afternoon with a frightful head
ache. Poor Graham had died shortly before
midnight the night before and 1 had not been
able to sleep, though I was very tired. I dare
say I was not altogether in what the doctors
call a normal condition, from the physical
fatigue and the effect generally of having
watched him die. I was feeling less earthly,
if you can understand, than one usually does.
It is—to me at least —impossible to watch a
death-bod without wondering about it all—
about what comes after-intensely. And Gra
ham was so good, so patient, and resigned and
trustful, though it was awfully hard for him to
die. He had every reason to wish to live.
Well, Anne, when I fell asleep that afternoon I
at once began dreaming about yon. I had
been thinking about you a great deal, con
stantly almost, ever since we set sail. For,
just before starting, I got a hint that this ap
pointment—l have not told you about it yet.
but that will keep; I have accepted it, as vou
see by my being here—l got a hint that it would
probably be offered me, and that if I didn’t
mind paying my passage back almost as soon
as I got but, I had better make up my mind to
accept it. I felt that it hung upon you, and
yet 1 did not see how to find out what you
would say without—without risking what I
had—your sisterly triendship. It camo into my
bead, just as 1 was falling asleep, that I would
write to you from the (Jape and tell you of
Graham s death to avoid any mistaken report,
and that 1 might, in my letter, somehow feel
my way a little. This was all in my mind, and
as I tell asleep, it got contused so that I did
not know afterward clearly where to separate it
from my dream.”
“Ami what was the dream?” asked Anno,
breathlessly.
“ Almost precisely what you saw,” he re
plied. “ 1 fan' ied mvselr here—rushing up
stairs to the library in ray haste to see you—to
tell you I was not dead, and to ask you if you
would have cared muoli had it been so. I saw
all the scene—tae hall, the staircase already
lighted, this room, and you coining in at tho
door with a half irightened, half eager look in
your iace. Then it grew contused. 1 next re
member standing here beside you on the
hearth-rug, witti my hand on your shoulder—
thus, An«ae—and ga ing into your eyes, and
struggling, struggling to ask you what I want
ed so terribly to know. But tho words would
not come, and tho agony seemed to awake me.
Yet with the waking came tho answer. Some
thing had answered me; I said to myself, ‘Yes,
Anne does love me.’ ”
And Anne remembered the strange feeling of
joy which had come to her even in the first bit
terness of her grief. She turned to the hand
that still lay on her shoulder and kissed it.
u Oh, Aeiineth,” she said, “ how thankful we
should be I But bow strange to tuink that we
owe it all to a dream I Was it a dream. Ken
neth?”
He shook his head.
“ You must ask that of wiser people than I,”
he said. “ 1 suppose it was.”
“ But how coaid it have been a dream ?” Anne
said again. “ You forget, Kenneth, Ambrose
saw you, too.”
“ Though I did not see h m nor even think of
him—yes, that makes it even more incompre
hensible. It must have been the old lellow's
devotion to you, Anne, that made him sympa
thize with you 'somehow.”
“ I am glad he saw yon,” said Anne. “ I
should preler to think it more than a dream.
And there is always more evidence in favor oi
any story ot the kind if it has been witnessed
by two. But there is one other thing 1 want to
ask you. It has struck me since that you an
swered me rather abstractedly thivt last even
ing when I spoke about your address, and
asked if there was any other ot the name in
your regimen-t.. Onoe or twice I have drawn a
faint ray of hope from remembering your not
very decided answer.”
“ Yes, it was stupid of me" I half remembered
it afterward. I should have explained it, but
it scarcely seemed worth while. I did know
another Major Graham might be joining ns at
Funchal, for that very day 1 had been intrust
ed with letters for him. But I was abstracted
that evening, Anne. I was trying to persuade
myself I didn’t care for what 1 now know 1
care for more Gian for liie itself—your love,
Anne.”
A CAL\mJu’£t’B paw.
IN QUICKNESS THE NEXT THING
TO LIGHTNING.
A Honesdale, Pa., correspondent writes: “If
there is anything quicker than lightning it's the
spat of a catamount,” said Morris Treadwell, oi
Damascus township, a well-known wildcat
hunter and trapper, as he placed the carcasses
of two enormous catamounts on the floor ot
Squire Eldred’s office in this village, whither
he had brought them to claim the bounty of $2
apiece on them. One ot them was nearly five
feet in length, and the other four feet, and
either of them could have carried off a sheep
with ease. That was just what they and two
others had been doing for some t’me, and only
three or four miles from thia town at that, up
along Penwarden’s brook.
“That big fellow there,” said Morris, “I dis
covered made his home in a cave up near John
Reifler’s place, and the other day when he was
out foraging 1 slipped a steel trap into the cave.
I timed the spring of one of my traps the other
day. and found that it took just the one-t nth
part oi a second for its jaws to come together
after the pan was touched. You can imagine
that anything that sets that trap off has got to
bo tolerably lively if it gets out before the jaws
fasten on it. Weil, I set a trap which was al
most as sudden as that, in the catamount’s cave,
and the next day went and crawled into the
hole to see if I had.him. I did, but seeing that
he was only held by the tips of the toes on one
lore foot, I made up my mind it wouldn’t be a
very sate investment ior me to gather him in.
Now, the catamount had stepped on the pan of
that trap without knowing it was there, but had
been so quick that he drew Lis foot nearly out
before the J, aw a closed.
“ That’s about tho suddenest thing I ever
saw, I said to myself, but I found out a few
minutes later that it was only a snail’s work to
what the cat could do. I went and got my
tenth-part-of-a-second trap, took it over to the
cave, set it, and pushed it in until it reached the
catamount, knowing that ho would give it a dip,
and expecting, of course, to have him foul at
the first clip. When the lightning trap came
within reach of him, ‘ spat’ went his free fore
paw. It struck the pan of the trap fair and
square. ‘ Bing!’ wont tho trap, but the jaws
closed on nothing. When I saw such greased
lightning work as that, and pulled the trap out,
I must say that I was staggered. I could hardly
believe my eyes.
“ But there wasn’t any doubt about the mat
ter, and I set my trap again, and shoved it in
for the catamount to practice on somo more.
Ho spatted the pan again, and the trap closed
on wind, just as it had before. Time after time
I tried to get that cat’s paw in the trap, but tho
cat was too quick. At last, on the eighth at
tempt—tho catamount having very likely got
tired by that time—the jaws came together and
caught the leg. Such yells I don’t believe any
mortal over before heard. They made me turn
cold. I pulled the catamount out by the chain
on the last trap, and, handicapped as he was by
both traps, I had to fight him over more than a
quarter of an acre before I could get a death
blow in on him. That catamount ought to yield
no less than eight bounties, for he was equal to
any eight catamounts that ever yelled.
“The small cat there I captured in a dead
fall trap, and it sent all his nine lives out at
once. I expect to have the other trwo that are
Jett up around Penwarden’s in a few days, and
then there are half a dozen up around Kim
ble's that I’ll take the contract to clean out.”
kindnessT
AN INCIDENT IN THE LIFE OF
“ An effort made for the happiness of others
lifts us above ourselves.” Therefore the young
should cultivate the art of kindness; lor the
truly great men are the truly kind men.
While Gen. Grant was President, he was at
one time the guest of Marshall Jewell, at Hart
ford, Conn. At a reception tendered him by
the Governor, where all the prominent men of
tho State were gathered, a roughly penciled
note, in a common envelope, signed by a woman,
was banded him. It was put into his hands by
a young politician, who thought it a joke that
“ an old woman in tatters” should presume to
intrude unon the President at such a time.
“ Yon need not bother about her; I sent Iter
away—told her yon were not hero to bo bored,”
the young man said to Grant.
The President’s answer much surprised the
politician. “ Where is this woman; where con
I find her?” he inquired, hurrying from tho
room. Tho letter he held in his hand, written
poorly in pencil, told a sorrowful story. It said
in substance:
“My son fought in your army, and he was
killed by rebel bullets while fighting for you.
Before he died he wrote me a letter which told
how noble a man you were, and said you would
look out ior his mother. I am poor, and I
haven t had money or influence to get anybody
interested in me to get a pension. Dear Gen
eral, will you please help me for my dead boy’s
sake ?”
Sadly the woman had turned away from the
mansion, her last hope dead. A servant<pointed
her out to President Grant, walking slowly np
the street. The old soldier overtook her qnick
ly. She was weeping, and turned toward him a
puzzled face as he stopped her and stood bare
headed in the moonlight beside her. The few
words the great, kind man spoke, turned her
tears into laughter, her sorrow into joy. The
pension before refused her came to her speedi
ly, and her last days were spent in comfort.
Here was a true man, whom the honor of the
world could not spoil I What wonder the world
mourned when ho was taken away before his
time,
thTarcbdruid.
THE HI,GH PRIEST OF THE AN
CIENT ENGLISHRELIGION.
(From the London Telegraph.')
Old Christmas Day was the eighty-sixth anni
versary of the birth ot Myfyr Morganiog, arch
drnid of the British Isle’s. Wales has never
been without its representative of the Gwyddon
tchiefbard or laureate oi Britain), whose dntv
it was sing with his harp that ancient tune
known as “The Monarchy of Britain,” before the
army on the eve ot its entering upon a cam
paign. The old religion becoming unpopular,
by degrees his office was iergetten. On the
evening of his natal anniversary the arehdruid
was visited by one of his disciples, who thus
narrated what took place :
“Ho sits to-day, a white-haired and white
bearded, aged priest, alone in an upper .hambar
in a street in Pontybridd. I took with mo to
him a presentation from a most generous, no
ble lord. It was tho gift of a Christian ehief
tain to the chief druid. The moment I entered
the lonely cell of the druid, the noMe old man,
with flowing beard, stood up to meet me, and
with extended hand, said, with sparkling eyes,
‘Biwyddn newdy Dda ’ (Good New York). "Ho
then uttered a druidic prayer for all blessings
to descend on the house ot Bute, and tho homo
ot Sir W. T. Lewis was not forgotten by him
who is preparing for ‘ Cylch Y Gwynfyd ’ (the
Circle ol tlie Holy World;. He said :
“‘ I shall be eighty-six to-morrow. lamina
hurry'to finish my writing for the benefit of the
whole world—writing which will restore the
Welsh people to tho van of the nations of the
earth. ’My writings can be compared to tbe
work of a man engaged in clearing away rub
bish which had fallen into a spring of water.
O, the rubbish 10, the stuff which had fallen
and hiddeu irom all eyes the source ot true
religion ! He then said: * Who will fight the
battles of the gods when lam gone ?’ He anb
seqnently remarked that the day of his de
parture wae close at hand, he felt hia strength
growing lesa daily; his memory, too, was not
what it once was. I ventured to ask him what
were his views respecting a future state ot ex
istence. His reply was: ‘My father and my
mother are well able to provide for me, and in ,
them 1 trust, and not in any one else.’ I asked
him what ho meant by hia * father and his
mother;’ he replied that the Creator was hia ■
father and Anian was hia mother.’ By Anian <
he seemed to mean the fecundating power of ‘
the earth, revealing her efforts in the Spring
time of the year. This, he said, ia the Venus
and the mother of the goda in ancient mythology.
Ho seemed to regard all creeds aa jumbling
confusions of Druid’sm, and to think that hia
mission in the world was to restore the primi
tive order of ancient times.”
(Buy Weddy
Thia darky would not put up with being
called
A NEW COON IN TOWN.
“Idoslahto explain a tragedy, sah.” said a very
intelligent-looking colored man to the captain in
the station-house.
•‘What is it?”
“ About an hour ago, sah, I was proceeding along
Hastings street A young man who was drivin’ a
delivery wagiu looked at me wid a very open coun
tenance and remarked dat dere was a new coon in
town. De refleckshun was intended to reflect on
me, sah.”
“ No doubt of it.”
“De young man was entirely mistaken, sah. Izo
lib'd iu Detroit twelve years. Dar’s nuffin new
'bout me. sah—not eben any new chilblains.”
“ But what about the tragedy ?”
“Well, sah, we collided. I specks I collided a
leetle mo’ wid him dan he did wid me. He cum
down off dat wagin, an’ he rolled around in de
snow, an’ when I got frew wid him he bore de ap
pearance of a blasted rose.”
“And what do you want done?”
“Nuffin’, sah. ’cept if I’m wanted fur dis tragedy
I want you to know whar’ you kin find me. Jist
send an officer to Mrs. Smith's, on Hastings street,
and hev him inquar’ fur Professor Babcock Sharp,
de gem'lan who imitates a mocking-bird to perfeok
shun, an’ who am an old coon in town.”
These few verses narrate the fact of
A LOVER’S DILEMMA.
We sat in the parlor, Clara and I—
One chair was all we required;
I’d “ popped ” to her only the moment before—
The answer was all I desired.
The light was turned low,
I was telling her that
She was my sweet all in all.
When, horrors ! I heard the loud patter pat
Of father-in-law's step in the ball.
We sat on the curbstone, my silk hat and I,
One curb was all we required.
For <£ had been squashed but a moment before,
While I had had alll desired.
There we gloomily sat,
I and my crushed silk hat;
And the moments I tried to recall—
'i re we were disturbed by the loud patter pat
Of her father’s rude step in the hall.
One of the Canadian colony from the United
States found that his friends thought
IT HAD BECOME MONOTONOUS.
A New Yorker lately met one of the American
colony in Canada, and in course of conversation
asked him the cause of his seclusion.
“ Why, I was a county treasurer in Illinois and
was sl3 short in my accounts,” was the frank reply.
“ Yon didn’t have to skip for sl3, did you ?”
“ Yes, sir.”
“ 1 should have thought you could raise that
among your friends.”
•• Yes. you may think so, but if you had seen ’em
put up $2,700 to save me on the other term you’d
understand that the thing had become rather
monotonous.”
It isn’t every day that a man has such a
GOOD OPPORTUNITY TO ROLL IN WEALTH.
“I am hard up,” said a tough-looking chap to a
citizen, whom he met on the street the other even
ing.
••So am I,” was the reply.
“ I’d like to borrow about fifteen cents.”
“ So would I.”
“Say I” said the man, as he came a step nearer;
“this is a piece of good luck. I was looking for
just such a man as you are. We are both hard up;
we both want money. There’s an old shoemaker
down here who keeps $250 under his bench. Come
down with me. I’ll take him by the neck while
you grab the boodle, and we’ll whack even.”
The millionaire begged to be excused, and the
stranger reproachfully called after him :
“ All right 1 If you had rather sleep under stair
ways and beg for cold vituals than roll in wealth,
that’s your lookout. Don’t go whining around
about hard luck, however. The man who won’t
kill an old shoemaker for $250 must expect Provi
dence to go back on him and keep him under.”
It was only through a merciful Providence
that he
SAVED HIS WAR RECORD.
A strapping big fellow was pulled out of the Ohio
' river after a steamboat explosion.
“Lost much ?” asked a sympathizing bystander.
“I should say so, ” said the dripping pilgrim—
“lost all my baggage.”
“ Much of it ?”
“ Well,”—hesitatinglythere was a pair of
stockings and a shirt.” Then, brightening up, ho
added, “But, thank God, I have saved my war
record I*’
With this he pulled out of his breast pocket a
very wot provost marshal’s certificate—that ho had
furnished a substitute.
'Tto lady camo pretty near
THE KIND OF GAME HE SHOT.
Mrs. Parvenu comes to the front again. She was
making a call, and in the course of the conversation
her friend remarked:
“ Mr. Jackson, I hear, has gone to the land of the
caribou and moose to have some shooting.”
Mrs. Parvenu met Mrs. Jackson some days later.
“Ahl” said she, “how is Mr. Jackson ? Has he
gotten back yet ?”
“ Yes, he came back last night.”
“ And did he shoot a caboose ?"
This old fellow knew what he did when he
declined to let them
LORE for gas.
Some prospectors in West Virginia found signs of
natural gas on a farm belonging to an old man, and
they went to his house and asked permission to
bore and make further development.
“ What's the gas good for ?” he asked.
“To iake the place of fuel.”
“ Will it taka the place of wood ?”
“Ob; yes.”
“Then you can’t bore a darn bore around here.
I’ve got five slapping big sons who are too infernal
lazy to do anything moren cut nnff wood to warm
their shins, and if we had nateral gas to burn I’d
have to hire a nigger to help the boys draw their
breath.”
Spinsters are very clever in discovering
THE SIGNS OF COMING MATRIMONY.
“You will hear of a marriage soon,” said a rather
prudish-looking dame to a lady friend in a horse
car the other morning.
“Shall I?” replied the lady. “And who is to bo
joined in the holy bonds of matrimony?”
“Why, that couple opposite us!”
“Where did you get the information? You are
not acquainted with them, are you?” ‘
“ No—never saw them before in my life.”
“Well, then, pray tell me how you got the in
formation?”
“I am sure of it,” replied the spinster. “ Didn’t
you see her moisten the end of her handkerchief
with her tongue and wipe a little dirt off the gentle
man’s cheek?”
“ The gentleman may be her husband,” said the
lady.
“Then she would have brushed it off with her
muff,” rejoined the spinter.
SCINTILLATIONS.
“ My motto is, ‘Live and let live,’ ”
sa : d the soldier as he turned his back te the enemy
and fled from the battle-field.
Professor—“ Name apotent element
in the art of drawing?” Student—“A mustard
plaster.” The professor collapsed.
• It is some satisfaction to argue -with
the man who holds a grab mortgage on your home
stead. He is always willing to accept your premises.
A little boy at Parsens, Kan., wrote to
Ssnta Claus lor a pony, but wa, wise enoush to
add : “ If he is a mule, please tie his behind lege.”
An honest Philadelphian, speaking of
the city’s regard tor art, said : •• W« tolerate it, we
have no taste tor it, but we are strong on tried oys
ters/*
" Won’t you stay for dinner, Dick ?”
“ Thanks—don't know but what I will. Do you
know, Harry, I’m so hungry to-night I could eat
anything I”
A pound of bananas, it is said, con
tains more nutriment than three pounds of meat.
The amount of profanity they contain when smeared
on the sidewalks, has not been calculated.
u What is Smith doing new ?” tf He
is traveling with a circus.” “Pretty hard work,
isn’t it ?” “No, he has nothing to do except put his
head in the big lion's mouth twice a day.”
“ What to Eat and How to Cook It,”
is the title of a book recently published. “ What to
Eat and Where to Get It,” would meet with a live
lier sale among the laboring classes just now.
Customer (in restaurant) —“Waitei,
this chicken soup has feathers in it.” Waiter--
•• Yes, sah. If yo’ want soup made outen chicken
old 'nough to be bald, sah, yo’ll have to ge to some
odder 'stablishment.”
A philanthropist asked the daughter
of a rich manufacturer, who employs hundreds of
men, if she ever did anything for her father’s
hands? “No,” was the reply, “bus I rub mine
with glycerine and oatmeal ever?
“I would like to call your attention,
madame,” said a peddler at the door, “ to the justly
celebrated balloon baking powder. It is absolutely
pure and ” “I’ve tried it,” said the womao.
“Oh, you have. Well, then—er—good day.”
•• What ? Women overworked ?
Fudge t Think of the men I" ■■ Ah, but you know
the old saying, • Woman’s work is never done.’”
“I know it, and that’s the reason .she oughtn’t to
complain. Now, a man has to do his work or lose
his job.”
Much has been written against the
accordeon. but the first evening after a young man
who practiced on one moved into the second floor
of a house a smile lit up the face of the aged gentle
man who lay iu sickness on the floor above. Ke
said that he was now reconciled to death.
She —“ John, I read to-day that some
body said that marriage was caused by propinqui
ty.” He— “Is that so? That must be the little
iellow without any clothes, who is always repre
sented as shooting an arrow through dark red
hearts. L’ut I never knew him called by that name
before.”
They tell in Louisville of a citizen of
that town who visited New York recently and lived
at one of the most expensive hotels. He stayed
four days and asked for his bill. “ Fifty-one dol
ars,” said the clerk. “ Guess again,” said the Ken
tuckian—“you haven’t sized my pile yet; I’ve
more money than that.”
A comical incident is related of an
eminent English nobleman who was presiding at a
press dinner. He concluded his few feeble remarks
by proposing the “ health of Gutenberg.” Some
one pulied his coat tails and whispered that he was i
dead. “I regret,” continued the nobleman, “to
announce that intelligence has just been received
that Gutenberg is dead.”
“ I wish I were yon star,” he said, .
dreamily. “So do I,” she returned, promptly, he
roically swallowing a yawn. “And why, dear one,”
he asked, impulsively, “ why do you wish I were
yon brilliant orb?” “Because,” she replied, in
cold, matt r-of-fact tones, “because you brilliant
orb is just 11,760,971 miles away.” And he faded
out like a mist before a Summer sun.
A PECULIAR GARMENT
WHICH A YOUNG LADY WORE
WHEN TOBOGGANING.
“ Yow know,” writes Clara Belle, “ the tobog
gan fever is new, and it ia newest at Orange, N.
J. The young men in charge of the chute did
not, and do not now, know enough to employ
men to stand at the end of the run to stop the
toboggans and get them out of the way while
their passengers leap off the track and save
themselves from flyers coming after them.
“The consequence was that very otten, just
as a couple of girls would be digging their heels
in the snow for a purchase by which to lilt them
selves to an erect position, along would come
another toboggan load, and send the first one’s
flying,
“That was a rare place for a study of hosiery,
I can tell you, aud even the most modest young
men could have told you that plain-colored
stockings, especially of dark shades, are now
the rule; indeed, more of the art and science
of female apparel than the mere stockings was
otten harshly contrasted against the pure white
snow.
“ Well-; one ot the girls—an ingenious and in
dependent miss—was just in that position the
other day, knees up, heels ground m, and hand
upraised for a lift from the gentleman, when,
flash! came a swilt toboggan, and away she
went, still seated, but flying like a swallow.
tTr rhe end of her flight found her with her
skirts well up under her arms, and nothing be
tween her and the ice but a single garment.
But what was that garment ? You should have
seen the girls flock around her, pretending to
shield her from the gaze of the male toboggan
ers, but in reality all striving to see what on
earth she had on. As they lifted her to her
feet and her blanket skirt fell in place, one put
the question:
“ ‘Where did. you get them ?’
‘“They’redhe style at LUdcau Hall/ she -Te
plied. '.
“ That was enough. Half a dozen of her in?
timates from that time on asked her every fif
teen minutes when she was going home, and
when she did go home they went with her, and
‘they,’ as the garment was called, was taken off
and handed around for inspection.
“ ‘They’ were simply a pair of trousers made
of brown toboggan’ blanketing, with the red
border at the waistband and at the ends of the
legs. A pair of trousers, I say, but they would
never have been put on by a man by mistake,
for two reasons: first, because there was a
largeness and looseness at the upper end, not
at all characteristic of tailor-made garments.
But they were cute. The red border was made
to ornament the ‘ they ’ at the waistband and at
the bottoms, and to fix them on were very cun
ning leather belts on the waist and leg bottoms,
each ending with three little morocco straps
fitted to silver-plated buckles. They reached
just below the knees.
•‘ That was three weeks ago, and to-day not
only have nearly all the girls who are fond of
tobogganing at Orange got them, but a friend
belonging to ‘the Ridgefield set’ at Albany,
writes mo that the case is the same there.”
KEEPING JHE SEAT.
AND COMPELLING THE LANGUID
YOUNG MAN TO STAND.
The cheap swells of New York, says a corres
pondent. are a source of infinite amusement.
One very amusing specimen is a long, indeed a
very long, young man, with a thin face, spindle
legs, and arms that seem composed of at least
three joints, and a chest about which a seven
inch hat band might easily be clasped. He is
pallid and white, and he affects the most as
tonishing English clothes.
Hecontly, when I was coming Into New York
from a short trip out on the Pennsylvania Hoad,
1 found this specimen seated in Iront of me. By
his side, on the same seat, were piled a number
ot satchels and bags, ornamented wi'thbig silver
initials and a square crown over them, which, I
suppose, passed lor a crest. Every other scat
in the oar. except the one occupied by the
satchels, was taken, when a largo man got in at
New Brunswick, and went up and down the
aisle twice, looking for a seat. Finally he ap
proached the young man, pointed to the
satchels, and said, quietly:
“ Are, you Keeping this seat for any one ?”
“ Haw;?” queried the long, young man, with
a supercilious look.
“ Whose seat is this?” said the large man a
little more loudly.
“ I’m aw-»aving it for a deah old chappie
friend of mine. He gets on at Newark, you
know.”
The large man considered for a moment that
it would be an hour before the tram would
arrive at Newark, glanced up and down the car
again, looking at the long, thin man, pointed at
the bags, and said curtly: “ Clear that seat?’’
“ No, ear, I will not I”
“ Clear the seat I”
“ I say-—”
The largo man did not wait to hear more, but
he grabbed the satchels one after another and
sent them spinning up and down the aisle as
Scotch curlers play their game on tho ice. Thon
the large man sank Ma three hundred pounds
heavily into the seal, pinning the dude in the
corner as though he were wedged there for life.
There was a silence of at least ten minutes, and
then the great swell, who was more pallid than,
ever, said, very meekly:
“May I go and get my traps, sir ?”
“Certainly,” said tho large man, rising and
. making Way 55? hini politely. “Go and get
them, by all means.”
So the lank and languid and extraordinarily
dressed young man went from one end of the
car to tho other, gathered up all of his belong
ings, and returned to his seat, which was now
quite fully occupied by the three hundred
pounder.
“ Am I to sit here ?” said the swell, timidly.
“No, little one,” said the three hundred
pounder, in a large and affectionate tone. "You
are to stand np with your little bags in your
nice little arms until we get to the end of the
road. I have a friend in New York waiting for
this seat.”
AN AMUSING IN CIDENT.
HE HAD TO LEARN FROM THE
NEWSPAPERS.
There is in the employ of the Postal Depart
ment a certain young letter-carrier, generally
known and liked, bright of eye and lithe of
limb, whom we shall eall Hiram Jones, because
he has a nice wile and cosy little home out
m the suburbs. Some time back there be
gan to be noticed in him a strange preoccupa
tion of manner, which, although it did not inter
fere with his duties, became more and more
marked as each day rolled by. His erstwhile
bright eyes.had a lar-away, speculative look in
them, and he often gazed aS his associates with
out seeing them, and listened to their best jokes
without a smile. He suddenly developed an ab
normal interest in the corner of the newspaper
to which it is said everyjeroman turns first—
“ Doattis, Births and Marriages”—and when
rallied about it blushed painfully, and stam
mered that ho wae only seeing who had been
married. On one occasion, when asked who.had
receipted for a certain " immediate delivery”
package, he answered “ A ten-pound boy,” and
being aronsed to a sense of the sitnation by tho
smiles of the clerks, made an abortive attempt
to prove that he had given the answer wittingly,
intending it for a joke.
Last Saturday, owing to tho absence of a clerk
in the delivery department, Jones was substi
tuted for bins, and time had no opportunity of
going home at noon, as was his wont. He be
came, in consequence, very restive. Shortly
before five o'clock the News appeared at the of
fice, and Jones, who had just finished an earn
est dissertation on the assininity ot department
officials who could not covdr ten miles of pave
ment in a week, and the outrageous regulations
they made for the overworked carriers, picked
up the paper. He glanced casually through the
locals, and gradually worked over to the
“ woman’s corner,” when suddenly his eyes be
came fixed in a stony glare on a particular par
agraph. He threw the paper from him, over
turned the stool on which he was sitting, fairly
shouting, “ Great Geewhilikens, a boy! Strikes
me she was in a hurry 1” and dashed, coatless
and hatless, through tho door and up the street
in the direction of home. The paper was picked
np by his astonished comrades, and they found
without trouble, under head of “ births,” the
following:
In this city, February 20, to the wifo ot Hiram
Jones, a son.
“Well,” remarked one of tho clerks, when
the roar had subsided, “he had to get the
news first from the newspaper, notwithstand
ing all his care.
THE FORCE OF IMA GINA TION.
THIS WAS A FAITH CURE.
Dr. Beddoes, an English physician of groat
enthusiasm, had imbibed the notion that palsy
could be cured by inhaling nitrous oxide gas.
Ho requested the celebrated Sir Humphrey
Davy to administer the gas to one of his
patients, and sent him for that purpose. Sir
Humphrey put the bulb of the thermometer
under the tongue of the paralytic to ascertain
the temperature of the body, so that he might
see whether it would be at all affected by the
inhalation of the gas.
The sick man, filled with faith from the as
surances of the ardent Dr. Beddoes, and sup
posing that tho thermometer was tho remedy,
declared at or.ee that he felt better. Davy, de
auu-ujH <.if seeing how much imagination would
do in such a case, then told him that enough
had been done for that time, and directed him
to come next day. The application of the ther
mometer was made from day to day in the same
way, and in a fortnight the man was cured.
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Aslc for Henry’s, and. Take
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10®"BEWARE OF COUNTERFEITS.
FOR SALE BY ALL DRUGGISTS.
JOHN F. HEiVRY & 00., NEW YORK.
SEND FOR ILLUSTRATED
■
PROF. CHS. LUDWIG VON SEEGER,
Professor of Medicine at the Royal University; KniyMtf
the Royal Austrian Order of the Iron Crown; Knight Com
mander of the Royal Spanish Order of Isabella; Knight qf
the Royal Prussian Order of the Red Eagle; Chevalier of
the Legion of Honor, Ifc., if c., says:
“LIEBIG CO.’S COCA BEEF TONIC
should not be confounded with the horde of trashy cure
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of Beef, Coca, Quinine, Iron and Calisaya, which are dis
solved in pure genuine Spanish Imperial Crown Sherry.**
Invaluable to all who are Run Down, Nervous, Dyspep
tic, Bilious, Malarious or afflicted wiih weak kidneys.
Beware of Imitations.
HER MAJESTY’S FAVORITE COSMETIC GLYCERINE.
Used by Her Royal Highness the Princess of Wales and
the nobility. For the Skin, Complexion, Eruptions,
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LIEBIG CO.’S Genuine Syrup of Sarsa
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N.Y. Depot 38 MURRAY STREET.
PARAUiTi
Is a most insidious disease
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Sleeplessness, Nervous Dyspepsia,
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"This is in no sensen PATENT MEDICINE. Con.
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SCOTCH OATS ESSENCE CO., 174 Fulton St. N.Y
FRENCH REGULATING PILLS.
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The original and only genuine (non-injurious) regu
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ly sealed, sent you by return mail. Ladies can address
us in sacred confidence. Mention this paper,
THE FRENCH SPECIFIC COMPANY,
St. Alban’s Place, Philadelphia, Pa.
"H" _n j-SLo JIL.
The Que§n Pyre Rubber Specialty
Indispensable to Ladies. No Drugs. Safe and always
reliable. Indorsed by prominent physicians and worth
its weight in gold. Enclose 4 cents (stamps) for full par
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can address us in sacred confidence. Mention this paper.
THE FRENCH SPECIFIC COMPANY,
St. Alban’s Place, Philadelphia, Pa.
eysu
Manual of all Diseases,
By F. HUMPHREYS, M. D.
RICHLY BOUJSD IN
CLOTH and GOLD
Mailed Free.
MSTOTPRETCrPALNOS. tJURjSS. PR’CS.
i | 1 Fevers, Congestion, Inflammations... .35
2 Worms, Worm Fever. Worm Colic2s
3 Crving Colic, or Teething of Infants. .25
r 4Di urrhes-of Cbihiyon or Adults .25
i o Dysentery, Gnping, Bilious C01ic.... .”5
6 Cholera Morbus, vomiting .. .2-5
T Coughs, Cold, Bronchitis.2s
8 Neuralgia, Toothache, Faceaeho2s
I 9 Headaches, Sick Headache, Vertigo.. .25
> .Homeopathac
10 Dyspepsia, Bilious Stomach..- .25
11 Suppressed or Painful Periods •J 35
12 Whites, too Profuse Periods .25
13 Croup, Cough, Difficult Breathing.... .25
14 Salt Rheum. Erysipelas, Eruptions.. .25
Ift Rheumatism, Rheumatic Pains...... .25
16 Fever and Ague, Chills, Malaria .ft(>
» 17 Piles, Blind or Bleeding- *5(9
29 Catarrh. Influenza, Cold in tlio Head. .CO
20 Whooping Coughs...
24 General Debility /Physical Weakness .60
27 Kidney Disease......
28 Nervous Debility....-..2..............1.00
30 Urinary Weakness, Wetting Bed6o
32 Diseases of the Heart, Palpitation.. 1 .OO
SPECIFICS.
Sold by Druggists, or sent postpaid on receipt of
price.—HUSPHFEYS* MEBICIXE CO., 100 Fallen St. N.Y.
. \ f / DR. YOUNG’S PATENT
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BEST TRUSS EVER USED I
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PENNYROYAL FILLS
"CHICHESTER’S ENGLISH.”
The Original and Only Genuine.
Bafts and always Reliable. Beware of worthless Imitatfonc.
Indispensable to LADIES. Ask your Druggist for
“Chickeater’s English” and take no other, or inclose 40.
(stamns) to us for particulars letter by return mail.
NAME PAPER, Chfeheater Chemical Co.,
8818 Madfeon Square, Philada., Pa.
Sold byDruggtsto every where. Ask for
ter’a jEngligu” Penny royal Pills. Take no other.
A enlarges, and de-M
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BORE WOT
Dr. Bohannan's ,f Vegetab!e Curative” is warranted to
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WORST CASES. It gives vitality and imparts energy
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N. E. corner of Sixth and Biddle streets, St. Louis, Mo.
Established in 1837.
■>gj“Dr. B.’s “Treatise on Special Diseases,’’ which
gives a clear delineation of the nature, symptoms, meant
ofcure, etc., of SYPHILIS, SEMINAL WEAKNESS
Etc., Scat Free to uuy- address upon receipt of«.: .u
7