The Georgetown news., 1855-12-13


agon of beauty, sweetness, good-breeding.
good every thing. AS often as this would
happen an unaccOuntable depression and
feeling OF loneliness and bereavement would
come over me, and last for hours. | can
now account for tit was the as vet mar
tlculatc, unintelligible premonition-a spe-
cleS OF spontaneous, unconscious appercep-
tiOn-0t nature, protesting against, and at
the same time preparing me for, the full
CONSCIOUSNESS Of the great loss | had suS-
tanned in losing my wife. My uncle had
named beautiful kitten after her; do YOU
wonder that | petted Jenny, and fed her and
caressed her every day [ remained in the
country? | do not. am naturally fond of
cats, and that they say, is sign [ am 60
ing to be an old bachelor. Well, what il it
IS?
When the summer was ended, | left my
uncle'5 and returned home still ignorant
that had lost my wife, and forgetting her
as before. For nearly year [ knocked
about among the young ladies, falling now
u little in love, and then falling out again;
charging myself with tickencss and want of
decision Of character, and wondering great
iy why | cOnld not fall really in love with
any body. Poor fool! didn't know that
there was nobody left to love; l was mar
ried and didn't know it. Many man is
in the same fix.
Things remained in this condition until
about a mcnth ago; when, having failed a
second time in business, [ concluded to
spend another summer at my uncle's The
cars dropped me at Plantationton; ] went
to the same old tavern, sat down in the same
old porch, i'll the same old split-bOttomed
chair, and looked over at the same old store.
and there, by Heayenl stood my wife, in al
most the very spot l had first seen her =
She was waiting for her husband, who was
following with the nurse and child. Her
husband was dark-skinned felloW-almost
as dark as myself and not very unlike me-
have since expended some severe thought
on this resemblance between me, the spirit
ual husband, and Thingamy, the phenome-
nal husband Of my wife, and it is perfectly
plain to my mind that, under the influence
Of the same spontaneous, unconscious ap-
perception, she was trying her very best to
marry me; in fact, did marry as near me as
she possibly could. How that fact has made
me love her
The whole party had come down on the
same train with me, and | had not known
it. Fate again. They stood opposite me
for some time, apparently resting, and had
the second and last Il know it will be the
LAST long, good look at her. She was great
ly changed. No longer the same buxom
blooming girl [ had seen her years before
patting her pretty foot against the sill, but
a beautiful woman, infinitely lovelier than
the girl; pale, but beautiful as the bright
fulfIlment of the perfect day is beautiful
More beautiful than the rosiest hues of the
uncertain dawn; thin, but beautiful as tho't
and loving cares beautify and make delicate
mere matter; older looking, but possessed OF
that ineffable charm which only the realiza-
ton Of woman's destiny can impart to wo-
man. | gazed on her, not with breathless
admiration as at first, but with calm, intel
ligent alteration. Positively, hers was and
is the sweetest human face in all this world.
Nothing, absolutely nothing was wanting
from those pale and gentle features; they
expressed all that wife and mother ought
to be. And even as [ gazed, there came
into my soul that strange pain of vacuity
and deprivatiOn-a numb and formless hurt
which needed only the light of reflection
to assume the acuteness of thought, the per
manence Of knowledge
From that day have known she was nv
wife; how | knew it and why | knew it, has
been told already, or if not told, never will
be, for it never can be. The knowledge or
conviction, if you prefer to call it so, grows
on me; it increases with the increasing LIGHT
OF morning, is revealed in the splendor Of
high noon, deepens in the pensive summer
twilight, and rises with the tutelary stars
The winds tell Of it to the melancholy trees
the waters repeat it with their many iQuiC
voices. 1t is written in cloudy hieroglyphs
upon the distant sky; it is the shadow
thrown upon the plain of life by the sun o.
hope which sinks behind my heart-enlarg-
ing and to enlarge, darkening and to in
crease in darkness until the night Of death
1t is-but | am getting absurd.
Shall l remain bachelor? DWindlc
down and shriyel up into an old bachelor?
Never Since / cannot marry my own
wife, III marry the wife Of somebody else;
and if | could only find the wife Of the man
who married my wife, Id marry her IN
spite Of fate. And If [ could only ride
about in The cars with q plenty of nurses
and children, and 1hingamy could see me
and know my theory, l should be perfectly
satisfied.
Dear reader. take warning by me; study
my theory; it was written for you, and for
the whole human race. Try to cultivate
your spontaneous, unconscious apptrc P
lion. And if ever YOU sit down in an Old
tavern porch and see a beautiful young lady
on the opposite side of the street, don't wait
for dinner, but go right over and demand
her in marriage. You may be mistaken;
she may not be your Uiie she may be al
ready married; but no matter, it is your
duty to make the effort. II you don't, you IL
regret it; you will find yourself in nv pre-