The River Falls journal. (River Falls, Pierce County, Wis.) 1857-1861, 1857-12-02
M ISCELLANY
B OY s EN- TIM ENT.
BY TX. MARVEL.

YN7 boyhood roll on, in the which
your dreams are growing wider and
granddaughter as the Spring, which
have made the type of the boy-age, is
stretching its foliage farther and farther,
and dropping longer and heavier shadows
on the land.
Nelly, that sweet sister, has grown into
your heart strangely; and you think that
all they write in their books about love,
cannot equal your fondness for little Nelly.
She is pretty, they say; but what do you
care for her prettiness? She is so good,
so kind-so watchful of all your wants,
so willing to yield to your naughty claims
But, alas, it is only when this sisterly
love is lost foreyer,-only when the inexo-
rable world separates family and losses
it upon the waves of fate to wide-lying
distances perhaps to graves that a
man feels, what boy can never know
the disinterested and abiding affection OF
sister.
All this, that have set down, comes
back to you long afterward, when you
recall with teas of regret, your reproach-
full words, or some swift outbreak of pas
sion.
Little Madge is friend of Nelly's--a
mischievous blue-eyed hoydcn. They
tease you about Madge. You do not of
course care one straw for her, but yet it
is rather pleasant to be leased thus
Nelly never does this; oh no, not She
do not know but in the age of childhoo l.,
the sister is jealous of the affections Of a
brother, and would keep his heart wholly
at home, until suddenly and strangely,
she finds her own-wandering
But after all, Madge Is pretty; and
there is something taking in her name.
Old people, and very precise people, call
her Margaret Boyne. But you do not !;
it is only plain Madge; it sounds like her
very rapid and misch;evous. 1t would
be the most absurd thing in the world for
You to like her, for she leases you in innu-
merable ways: she laughs at your big
cboao. (r,,nb n eu-oc+ I+4Ia foo+ -, II . I, a., "
and she pins strips ofpaper on your coat
collar; and time and again she has worn
off your hat in triumph, very well know
ing that You, such quiet body, and so
much afraid of her, will never venture
upon any liberties with her gypsy bonnet.
You sometimes wish, in your vexation,
Is you sec her running, that she would
fall and hurt herself badly; but the next
moment. it seems very wicked wish,
and you renounce it. Once, she did come
very near it. You were all playing to-
gether by the big swing-(how plainly it
swings in your memory now !)-Madge
had the seat, and you were famous for
running under with long push, which
Madge liked better than anything else;
well, you have half run over the ground,
when crash comes the swing, and poor
Madge with it! You fairly scream rs you
catch her up. But she is not hurt-only
a cry of fright, and a little sprain of that
fairy ANGLE; and as she brushes away the
tears, and those flaxen curls, and breaks
into merry laugh,-half at your woe
worn face, and half in vexation at herself;
and leans her hand (such hand )upon
your shoulder, to limp away into the shade
you dream-your first dream of love.
But it is dream, not at all acknowledged
by you: she is three or four years your
junior, too young altogether It very
absurd to talk about it. There is nothing
to be said of Madge-only- Madge !
The name does it.
1t is rather o pretty name to wrlte.-
You are fond of making capital Ms and
sometimes you follow it with n capital A
Then you practise little upon D, and
perhaps back it up with G. Of course
it is the merest accident that these lette rs
come together. 1t seems funny to you
very. And as a proof that they arc
made at random, you make a [ or an R
before them, and some other quite irrel
evant letters after it.
Finally, as sort Of security against al
suspicion, you cross it out-cross it a great
many ways even holding it up to The
light to see that there should be no air Of
intention about it.
You need have no fear, Clar.
ence, that your hieroglpphics will be stud
led SO closely. Accidental as they are
you are much more interested in them
than any one else!
II is common fallacy of thi
/ dream In most s.sces of life thu. VOC