Ashtabula weekly telegraph. [volume] (Ashtabula, Ohio) 1853-1873, 1858-10-02

g ter is with God. She died whispering tha
:, she would wait for John Markham"
), endured the knowledge of her deat
Z with benumbed patience uncomplainngly
rarely weeping a single drop. | wen
+ through the unvarying round of day labo
/; in the prison yard with steady mechanics
Z industry which surprised my taskmaster-
for heretofore had been tuunted as "tht
weak gentleman" white fingers" ant
whatever other epithet or insult the harden
cd bullies of discipline are accustomed, a
discretion and without fear of resentment
to confer upon the wretched in their grasp
At evening, held up the tress into tha
faint twilight which just auttered through
my CRATES, and kissing it, seemed to see heI
by me-for | could never think Of her as
dead. That realization was kindly spared
me by the fact that no new void can he felt
no new unnaturancss, in the eternal void
and unnaturalness of prison.
But one night coming from work found
the tress gone. Asking the turnkey for it,
was told, "PrisoHers are allowed no use-
less articles" From that moment / knew
that she whom loved was dead Like n
wild freshct the agony of the knowledge
gushed in upon me. With it came the
memory of my wrongs-the scorn Of man
spent upon my innocent head-the perfdy
of my only brother--the irrcdeemable help
Iessness of all things. And | shut myself
up in sullen, silent madness. A most dan
gerouS madness it was. From the time
that lost the tress five years were to
elapse before went out, and if in that
time revolt had sprung up in prison had
died fighting in its front, for l was ripe for
any crime. AS it was only bode my
time. Once out would wreak condignest
vengeance on society ~ on law--on my
brother.
The five years passed-fve years of dust
aud cIiDkiUg in the yardA-of darkness, NUT
tering low, smothered heart burning in the
cell. At last, one morning, the warden
threw open my door, and passed out with
the slow lock step which had been prac-
ticing nearly the quarter of lifetime. /
was going to chapel with the rest-to hear
of the Prodigal Son and the Magdalen-
they the guilty, but the welcomed-I the
innocent, yet the thrust out But the off
Ger stopped me with these three words
"You are free !"
did not cheer, nor wiring the mans hand,
nor even smile. One grows used to forget
these ways Of the world after fifteen years
in prison.
But the revenge which, little by little,
had stretched its fibrous roots through the
soil of my heart till every drop of life juice
went to noursh the plant, now began to
put forth its blossoms, aud / felt them bud
into ecstatic, poisonous fragrance. NJ,
sweet, lOng-hoped-for hour had come H.
a few moments more the despiSed conyic,
should burst open his motley chrysalis, ano
be rushing like winged Nemesis to settI,
accounts v ith a world which had the starr
of him by fifteen years.
| went to the prison wardrobe and 90, |
back that dress which, in the days long |
gone | had put off with the rest of my
humanity. They were clean, fastidously
gentleman-like as when left them. / seem
ed for moment, at their sight, to be wax
ing from the terrible eternity of bad dream
to be finding them folded by my bedside,
where they had lain only since the last
night
had come in with the majesty of the |
lava guard on either side | went out
alone--no danger was apprehended of my
escaping from that other prson-the world |
Leaving the high gray walls behind me, / |
struck into the road for Hartford. Had |
come out five years before, | might have
been expressly softened by the long, un.
wonted mHsic of the birds that, from the
trees and orchard walls, made the air full of
their joy. Now had lived past the time
when such things could touch me, and walk
ed still in the loek-step, looking neither
about nor forward, but ever moodily on the
ground. And thus, late in the afternoon,
came whittier the commencement of my
recital finds me, and stood in the market
place of the town which had last seen fade
out behind me as l went away in scorn
No wonder that 10y all the paSsers was
stared at as an oddity-something to be
and Shrunk from, for my grlzzled
hair was of the prison cut, my clothing had
gone ont of fashion when the fathers in the
street we're children, and not by fear but
Ong use, looked no man in the face. And
here and there in knots the people whisper
ed about me, sometimes with evident care
essnesS as to how loud. But only nurs-
I'd deeper and more quiet wrath.
ihStS SHihC lndL way u lufOUR Oh |
children just from school, Stepping up to
one of them, asked, docs George Mark
nam still live in this placer" The little girl
turned up a sunny Spring morning face and
Il am his daughter, Sir; do yon
wish to see himw
A hellish thought suggested itself to me-
said, eyes, you may show me the way to
his house" l knew we should take a cross
path over the fields and past long reach
of lonely woods. In the most solitary part
of that | might wreak upon the guilty head
of George Markham, the most terrible ven
geance which could wipe out his most bit
ter wrong to me would kill his child /
aud bring her homo to him, confessing that
did it, and glorying in the end of that
horrid game of quits on whose first throw
he had staked my heaven and lost it.
The little maiden took my hand, conf
dinghy That might unnerve me; so / oos-
ed il and told her TO go before while fol-
lowed. She tossed back her eurls and went
bounding ahead at rate my strides were
hardly equal to. Still kept my eye upon
her. After while we came into low
brook-course between two hills, over the
foremost of which | could Just see the chin
r