The Cecil Whig. [volume] (Elkton, Md.) 1841-current, 1851-09-13
EARLY FRIENDS.
FROM IKE MARvEL's "REvERlEs OF A
BACHELOR"

l cannot sit now, as once upon the
edge of the brook, hour after hour fling
ing off my line and hook to the nlbbling
roach, and reckon it great sport. There
is no girl with auburn ringlets to sit be-
side me ard play upon the bank. The
hours are shorter than they were then;
and the little joys, that furnished boy
hood till the heart was full, can fill it no
longer. Poor Tray is dead long ago;
and he cannot swim into the pools for
floating sticks, nor can sport with him
hour after hour and think it happiness.
The mound that covered his grave is
sunken; and the trees that shaded it are
broken and messy.
Little Lillyis grown into woman
and is married; and she has another lit.
tie Lilly, with faxen hair, she says
looking as she used to look. | dare say
the child is pretty, but it is not Lilly.
She has little boy too that she calls
Paula chubby little rogue-shc writes,
and as mischievous as ever was. God
bless the boy!
Ben, who would have liked ride in
the coach that carried me away to school
has had great many rides since then
rough rides, and hard ones, over the
road of life. He does not rake up the
falling leaves for bonfres as he did once;
he is grown to be man, and is fighting
his way somewhere in our western
world, to the short lived honors of time.
He was married not long ago; his wife |
remembered as one Of my playmates at
my first school, she was beautiful, but
fragile as leaf. She died within
year of their marriage. Ben was but
four years my senior; but this grief has
made him ten years older. He does not
say it but his eye and figure tell it.
The nurse who put the purse in my
hand that dismal morning, is grown a
feeble old woman. She was over fifty
then; she may well be seventy now. She
did not know my voice when went to
her the other day, nor did she know my
face at all. She repeated the name
when | told it her-Paul, Paul, she did
not remember any Paul, except little
boy long while ago-"To whom
you gave purse when he went away,
and told him to say nothing to Lilly or
to Ben !"-"Yes that Paul." said the
old woman exulting edo you know hint"
And when told her-"she would
not have believedit!" But she did; and
took hold ofmy hand again (for she was
blind) and then smoothed down the
plaits of her apron, and logged her
strings, to look tidy in the presence of a
gentleman. And she told me long sto-
ries about the old house, and how the
people came in afterwards, and she called
me "sir" sometimes, and sometimes
PAUL" But | asked her only to say
Paul; she seemed glad for this and talked
easier; and went on to tell of my old
playmates; and how we gathered nuts
such heaping piles; and how we used to
play fox and geese through the long
Winter evenings; and how my poor
mother would smile--but here | asked
her to stop. She could not have gone
on much longer, for | believe she loved
our house and people better than she
loved her own.
As for uncle, the cold, silent man, who
lived with his books in the house on the
hill, and who used to brighten me some
times with his look, he grew very fee
BILE afterl left, and almost crazed. The
country people said that he was mad;
and Isabel with her sweet heart chung to
him, and would lead him out when his
step tottered, to the seat in the garden,
and read to him out of the books he low
ed to hear. And sometimes, they told
me, she would read to him some letter
that | had written to Lilly orto Ben, and
asked him if he remembered Paul who
saved her from drowning under the tree
in the meadow? But he could only
shake his head and mutter something
about how old and feeble he had grown.
They wrote me afterwards that he
died, and was buried in a far away
place, where his wife once lived, and
where he now sleeps beside her. Isabel
was struck with grief, and came to live
for time with Lilly; but when they
wrote me last, she had gone back to her
old home-where Tray was buried
where he had played together so often,
through the long days of Summer.
| was glad | should find her there
when came back. Lilly and Ben
were both living nearer to the city when
! landed from my long journey over the
seas; but still | went to Isabel first. Per-
haps had heard so much oftener from
the others, that | felt less eager to see
them; or pcrhaps--l did not think tt
perhaps | loved Isabel better than them
all.
So went into the country, thinking
all the way how she must have changed
since left: =" She must now be nineteen
or twenty; and then her grief must have