The River Falls journal. (River Falls, Pierce County, Wis.) 1857-1861, 1858-11-03

Z
The foul, coarse pallet on which at inter
walls I threw myself in my bewildered
WEAKNESS, did not >ehafe me by its coffir
narrowness. I was beyond hurt from
such things; for in the five minutes be.
tween my lodgings and my cell had be-
come aware that | was brought to posi-
ton whose sublime awfulness could not
be .equalled by anything else on earth.
Quicker by far than I can write, yet in
this channel had my thoughts run. %
| My brother, three days ago, gave me
in private a heavy draft to be collected at
another banking house, drawn in his favor
by one of his correspondents and indorsed
by another. | remember that he looked
restless when he gave it to me; that he
hurried from the room Immediately after
ward. l presented the draft; | received
the money; the books which | keep bear
no account of it. He forged the paper.
| am the suspected one. l have no
means of proving my innocence, unless.
perhaps, by proving his guilt. This,
most like, is impossible. At any rate,
what terrible step for man to take
against his dead mothers only other child !
And he has lovely wife whom it would
p -
slay, Yet myself havoc God. shut
out her image from me Ill must not see
it; | shall so mad! '.'''
/ In this groove my thoughts rolled back
and forward through the night. Facing
this alternative, | stood till the day of
my trial-just one month. My brother
came often to see me; he Iavished tears
and embraces upon me; lie retained for
me the best Of counsel--yet he always
seemed like one in delirium of fever,
and ever, just as the turnkey swung back
the heavy door to let him out, he would
stop for moment trembling, and with
his lips half open, as if about to say some
thing more to me-then, without meet
ing my eve, he would rush from the cell.
Suffering as | was, suffering still more
as was about tptlo, from the consequent
ces of his sin-I could pity him deeply.
could not forbcar with the cowardice
which could not confess, for [ knew how
priceless liberty must be to a man who,,
losing it, leaves his other soul in that
most heart broken of all widowhood--the
widcwhopd of q conyicts's wife. She
whom | loved visited me many times.
always bringing me sweet messages in
her presence fromthc birds, and the flow.
ers, and tho free sky outside-always
talking with q voice intensely sustained
into cheerfdlness, Of my acquittal and
restoration to our old hopes. | told her
| was innocent, and She believed me. l
could not tell her who was guilty. 10 al
My trial came on [ n:ed not pain
myself with long recital of the thronged
court, the weary qucstionings and cross
questionings, the audible silence of the
crowd when the pleas were made, the
moment whose shadow fell upon me
when the foreman solemnly said "guilty'
that other moment when [ was con-
demned to the awful alienage of prison
for the fifteen years to come. as'a .if1os
Then l parted from Tome and friends.
My brother did not bid me goodbye; he
lay sick of a raging fever, on whose chan
ces hung life. But she, the holy and he
roic- who had borne all things, came to
see me go. She clasl ed my manacled
hands in her own; she pressed one long,
last kiss upon the convict's lips; she said,
with a solemn cheerfulness, "I will wait
for you" Then with superstition
which, frivolous though it seems, still
crept into the awfulness of the holr, l
stopped my watch, and vowed inwardly
that its hands should never more move
tillwe met again. Rae so5f. .at5r aa1 49,.
After that, the gates of my prison
opened to let in but one message from
the life outside. The chaplain brought
me lock Of well known soft brown hair,
and told me, with tear in his eye, that
an old man had given it to him for me,
saying "My daughter is with God. She
died whispering that she would wait for
| John Markham." e. a,f. fa9 f4a.v "a
/ endured the knowledge of her death
with o benumbed patience, uncomplain-
ingly, rarely weeping single drop. |
/ went through the unvarying round of day
labor in the prison yard with a steady,
mechanical industry which surprised my
/ taskmaster, for heretofore | had been
tainted as the weak gentleman 'swhite
fingers and whatever other taunt or In
suit the hardened DULLES of discipline are
accustomed, at discretion and without fear
| of chastisement, to confer upon the wretch
ed in their grasp. Atevening, held up
the tress into tho faint twilight which