Holmes County Republican. [volume] (Millersburg, Holmes County, Ohio) 1856-1865, 1857-07-30

creating suspision, left the office.
With a speed as rapid as was capable
of, l started for the office of the Morning
-. A friend, whom l met on th,
way, the next day laughingly demanded al
apology of me for the rough manner il
which / had jostled him aside, when ht
grasped my hand, and would have spoken
with me. But remembered it not. The
busy street was all blank space to me
that afternoon. The din of carts, and car
riages, and newsboys' cries, fell not upon
my ear. But one thought filled me-but
one hope animated me, and that was to
see my poor friend G. in time tc
save him from the clutches of the law.
l rushed madly into the office, and found
G. quietly sitting at his desk, en-
gagged in writing. l seized him wildly, and
bade him not to speak, but follow me to
my room. Arm in arm, we went together,
l pulling him along with rapidity that must
have alarmed him. Not a word was said
till my attic chamber was reached; and
then, when l had bid him be seated, L pull
ed out my notebook and told him to read
the transcript had made-the record Of
his crime. He read it through calmly and
quietly, and when he had reached the end
ing, the notebook dropped from out bis
hand, and he following it, fell upon the
floor, where tears and sobs for moment
choked his utterance, as he tried to speak
to me. l bade him be calm, and whisper
ed words of hope into his ear; and passed
away, he seated himself upon my bed and
told me the sad secret of his life; and for
the first time fully learned why it was
he had so long been hoping for the Lethe
Of forgetfulness.
He was the only son of a somewhat cele-
brated divine, in the State of -, and
his mother was widow. His father, ere
he died, had intended him to follow in the
footsteps of his sacred calling, and all that
paternal fcndness could offer was lavished
on bis education. When eighteen years of
age, he entered college at -, and
there his brillialt intellect, and the noble
qualities of his heart, young as he was,
drew around him crowd of admirers
He was loved, and he was flattered.-
Mingling with the gay and reckless, youths,
who in college-life are usually made up of
most intellectual, he joined them in their
revels, and in an evil hour became an in
itate at the gaming table, which was found
at the time even in the uritan city of
From that moment he became
victim. His liberal allowance was squan-
dered always at the hell to which he had
been introduced, and after three constant
years of torture, such as only the gamester
knows, he found himself disgraced with
debt from which he saw no hope ofrelease.
His father had in the meantime died, and
he had well nigh exhausted his poor moth
er's patience and her purse, by his frequent
demands upon the latter. During this
time his nervous intellect could not be
slumbered, even by deadening influence of
gaming, and he became ripe scholar
But misery had marked him for a victim,
and ALREADY he began to long for the Lethe
of foretfulness. At last, when in state
of utter desperation, temptation seized him,
and one day, after a nights debauch at the
gaming table, knowing that one of the Pro-
fessors had SUM of money in the bank,
he procured check filled it with the sum
of two thousand dollars, forged the Profess
sor's signature, and drew the money. Ut
terly desperate, he started that night for
New York, and two days after, finding a
ship about to sail for Callao, he took pas
sage in her, and in four months found him
self in Lima.
For three years and over he was a wan
derer-a wonderer through the cities and
the wilds of South America. His nervous
brain would never let him rest, and so he
continued to study and to learn, always
having with him one or more books, in
which he became proficient. He roamed
into the heart of Peru, lived for months
among the natives on the banks of the
wildly flowing Amazon, roved over the
broad Pampas, lived the life of an out
always looking forward to the
Lethe of forgetfulness. At last his means
were exhausted, and in utter despair again,
be went on board an American ship at
and worked his passage home,
hoping that he and his crime were forgot
ten, and that yet he might find his Lethe
among his fellow-men, and intending, if it
was life's labo-, to atone, as fully as he
could, for his youths crime. An advertise
ment had attracted him to the Office ofthe
Morning , after he had spent days
of hunger, and nights of restlessness and
sorrow. In the humble guise and employ
ment ola newspaper reporter, he had hoped
to pass unheeded of the world, and with
singular lack of prudence, to say the least,
which afterward often wondered at, did
not even change his name. But some
sharp eye had seen him, and a reward was
set upon his head.
This was his sad tale. He told it to me
through tears and sobs, and when be had
again offered him words of
comfort and of hope; but they came too
late, and fell upon his ear with no joyful
sound. He seized me by the hand, and
saying "Good-by, Ned; God bless you"-,
rushed from my attic, while struggled to
detain him. But he was gone, and nev-
er saw him more.
A few months afterward, inspired with
love of adventure, and the hope perhaps of
military glory, l left for California a
new, an almost unknown land. NV own
wild life, now in the soldiers tent, or bv |
the bivouac fire, and then by the side of
the cold mountain streams, searching for
the golden treasures, which they bore
down with them, had almost erased from
my memory the name ofmy poor friend.-
In the early part of 1s49, however, came
to San Francisco, and entering one day the