New Oregon plaindealer. (New Oregon, Iowa) 1859-1866, 1859-08-27

oAAO oA1u ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS at COun.
sci than consolation, andno way adapted
to fill the vacant place in Hitty's heart.
SO the years wore away, and Miss
Hydes early beauty went with them.
She had been blooming, delicate girl,
the slight grace of daisy in her fig
ure, wild-rose tints on her fair cheek, and
golden reflections in her light brown
hair, that shown in it's waves and curls
like lost sunshine; but ten years of such
service told her story plainly. When
Hitty Hide was twenty-six, her blue eyes
were full of sorrow and patience, when
the shy lids let their legend be read; the
little mouth had become pale, and the
corners dropped; her cheek, too, was tint
less, though yet round; nothing but the
beautiful hair lasted; even grace was gone
so long had she stopped over her father.
Sometimes the unwakened heart within
her dreamed, as girls heart will. State
ly visions of Sir Charles Grandson bow
ing before her,-shuddering destinations
over the image of that dreadful Lovclacc,
nothing more real haunted Hitty's i'm
agination. She knew what she had to
do in life, that it was not to be happy
wife or mother, but to waste by a bedrid-
den old man, the only creature on earth
she loved as she could love. Light and
air were denied the plant, but it grew in
darkness,-blanched and unblooming, it
is true, but still a growth upward, toward
light
Ten years more of monotonous pa
tience, and Miss Hyde was thirty-six.
Her hair had thinned, and was full of
silver threads; wrinkle invaded either
check, and she was angular and bony;
but something painfully sweet fingered
in her face, and certain childlike inno-
cence of expression gave her the air of a
nun; the world had never touched nor
taught her.
But now Judge Hyde was dead; nine
teen years Of petulant, helpless, hopeless
wretchedness were at last over, and all
that his daughter cared to live for was
gone; she was an orphan, without near
relatives, without friends, old, and tired
out. DO not despise me that say cold"
you plump and rosy ladies whose life is
in It's prime of JOY and use at thirty-six.
Age is not counted by years, nor calcula-
ted from ones birth; it is fact of wear
and work, altogether unconnected with
the calendar l have seen a girl of six
teen older than you are at forty have
known others disgrace themselves at six
ty-tive by liking to play with children
and eat sugar-plums!
One kind of youth still remained to
Hitty Hyde,-the freshness of experi-
ence. Her soul was as guileless and as
ignorant as child's; and she was strand
ed on life, with large fortune, like a
helmless ship, heavily loaded, that breaks
from its anchor, and drives headlong up
on reef.
Now it happened that, within a year
after Judge Hyde's death, Abner Dim
ock, the tavern-keeper's son, returned to
Greenfield, after years of absence, a bold.
faced handsome man, well-dressed and
"free-handed," as the Greenfield vernac-
ular hath it. Nobody knew where Ab-
ner Dimock had spent the last fifteen
years; neither did anybody know any
thing against him; yet he had no good
reputation in Greenfield. Everybody
looked wise and grave when his name
was spoken, and no Greenfield girl cared
to own him for an acquaintance. His
father welcomed him home with more
surprise than pleasure; and the whole
household of the Greenfield Hotel, as
Dimocks Inn was new-named, learned to
get out of Abner Dimock's way, and obey
his eye, as if he were more their master
than his father.
Left quite alone, without occupation
or amusement, Miss Hyde naturally grasp
ed at anything that came in her way to
do or to see to; the lawyer who had been
executor Of her fathers will had settled
fho ocfofo on1 r~oxo Loo1-