The daily press. (Cincinnati [Ohio) 1859-1859, 1859-07-01

" CINCINNATI, FRIDAY, JULYI.
[From the New York Ledger.
FALSE AND TRUE;
OR,
CAPTAIN UNDERHILL'S PRESENT.


salubrous, being both clear and bracing.
Captain Underhill, who was supposed to be
| one of the wealthiest men in the place, had re-
tired from business many years before, and
after living quite alone, in the fine house he had
built for many years, with only an old house,
keeper and strange looking, foreign serving
| man (wbo might have passed for the original
of Major Bagstock's "native," so miserable and
mortally afraid of his irasciblo master was he)
had suddenly brought home his daughter Mar
ca, who, as soon as she had appeared at
| church, was pronounced, by universal accla-
nation, the belle of Beverly. ....
No doubt Captain UnderhilI was good deal
astonished and puzzled at his sudden accession
of popularity, at this period. He had never
made himself very agreeable to his neighbors
| In n community where wealth gives power and
position, he had always been treated with re-
spect, but it was that distant respect which al
most precudes the idea of personal intercourse.
In fact, his towns people had been so extremely
respectful that one less sublimely self conscious
might have felt himself stunned. But such an
idea never entered Captain UnderhlPs mind,
and he was quito satisfied with the awe which
he supposed he inspired.
He had been a good deal "put about" to
use bis own expression, by the necessity Of
bringing Marcia home. He knew very little
| about her, and had never oomprehended the
change which years had wrought in her. To
him she was but the child for whom certain
moneys must be disbursed. As for her affoc
tion, or society, or care, those were things he
had done very well without all his life, and
they had never entered into his calculations of
the future. He had not thought of them in
bringing her home, but only of the annoyance
| of having his regular habits and systematic
routine of living disturbed by the changes a
new inmate would create.
Twenty years before, his wife had died dur
ing one of his voyages, leaving her infant
of few days old to the care of a widowed
sister, whose homo was in an inland town
about sixty miles distant from Beverly. Here,
ON his return, Captain Underhill went to see
the infant, and again after three years, when
he came back from his last voyage. And from
that time he had visited his sister and child
yearly, spending one day with them, paying
bills, scOlding good deal, giving good
many contradictory orders, but taking very
little real fatherly interest in his motherless
child.
Thus seventeen years of his shore life had
passed away. He had settled into numberess
confirmed habits Of self-indulgence, and held
his two servants in such awe of him that they
seemed to live, move, and breathe only for his
comfort, when suddenly came tidings Of his
sisters mortal illness, and summons to her
, bed side.
He went, grumbling, and swearing a great
oaths were so much customary form of speech
with him as to lose the character of intentional
blasphemy, and asseverating, over and oveI
: again, that his sister could not be really i'll
but that it was just an old woman's whim to
get him away from his home at this unaccus-
toned period. But he found her dying. He
stopped to attend her funeral, to arrange he,
worldly affairs, and then, ms he could not SCI
what better to do, he brought Marcia home
with him.
Thus it was that she appeared in her father
house and at church, and all Beverly pro
nounced her beautiful and commenced forth
with to court Captain Underhill in order t
> make her acquaintance.
1t was autumn when Marcia Underhill cam,
homo. Before winter she had secured the &C
quaintance of everybody worth knowing il
! Beverly, and when the festive season com
menced she mingled occasionally in the NOR
quiet parties of pleasure. Beverly was gay
J. town for a country one, and parties were fire.
quent, and on scale of splendor which nigh
J. surprise the dwelers of cities, who consider al
! magnifcence monopolizcd by their own cir
' cles, but Marcia, being in mourning, mingled
but moderately in these festivities.
But even with this her father was by n,
means pleased. He had made her useful b,
y accepting her offers to mix his "grog," as h
called the stiff jorum of punch wherewith h
10 was wont to regale himself of evenings, anC
M to play at cribbage and backgammon, his ia
% vorite games, so that he missed her a goot
deal. But this he was not willing to acknowl
}. edge, and complained nightly of being dis
turbed by the noise occasioned by her late re
turn.
Marcia was girl of considerable spirit, an
l. while she had come homo with firm determi
nation to do her duty thoroughly, and, if pos
sible, to win her fathers regard, she was by n
means prepared to submit to unreasonable ex
D. actions. Her father had never treated her q
a child. He had never done anything for he
except upon compulsion, and had made he
heart, already wrung by her sad loss, yer
heavy by tho complaints he had made of th
annoyance of having new inmate of hi
house. So Marcia determined that she woul
not yield up all her youthful pleasures to b
whims, and she did not. Even Captain Under
q hill, who was accustomed with much blusterin
II and terrible threats to carry his points, on a
occasions, and with nearly all persons, foun
that quiet, smiling girl of twenty, could hay
way of her own and pursue it, too, in spite
s. him, with the same ease and grace that 81
had made his home SO doubly pleasant, an
his neighbOrs so affable to him, and brightene
nd his existence altogether, without his ber
Id aware of the causes that worked the change.
IN He did not cease to complain, however, uni
he fell i'll of gout. Then Marcia nursed hi
To- so patiently and deity, and was so indefatig
was a very nice thing to have daughter, aft
=, all, and to cast about in his mind for son
= way to reward her.
: Captain Underhill was by no means mser
man. He had wealth, and he had alwa
- been liberal with his money. But in doing
L. good deed, he, like many other persons, We
at willingly sought to benefit himself at the saI
time.
Now, as he was recovering from the go
err and looked around his tidy, cheerful room, a
upon the bright face of his daughter, a
thought of the dscomforts that had surround
him when he had been i'll before, and the ha
gard, withered face of his ancient houseksep
os, and the scared, bewildered expression that v
Is wont to rest upon the dark features of the 81
- tive" on like occasons-when he found Il
his food was so appetising, and even his me
n oines so much less nauseous, from her hal
= he could not but acknowledge to himself Il
S'' she was good girl and deserved a reward.
lie remembered, and he considered it v,
7. bright thought, that girls of twenty sometir
. are sought in marriage. Now, Marcia '
twenty, for he bad asked her only the day
ET fore, and it might be that she would like b
kss band. At any rate, somebody might wish
ailg marry her, and the best reward he could C
ah ceive ofwas to find her husband. And wi
~ Ioolin0 for a su;fa hIa nayqon for Maroi