The weekly Ottumwa courier. [volume] (Ottumwa, Iowa) 1857-1872, 1859-10-27
N. Y. Correspondence fthe Memphis Inqnirer.
New YoRK. Sent. % 1880

Floating along with the current of human
lty which one encounters, or rather mngles
with, in large city, is many an isolated in
dividual whose heart history, if uncovered to
the gaze of the world, would surpass in It's
intense reality all the romances ever invent
ed While | write, an instance is passing
along in the crowd under my window in the
person Of wretched looking man, after
whom people turn to gaze and wonder how,
"a human form divine" came to be reduced
to degradation so complete and irredeem-
able. Ragged, begrimmed with dirt, hair
uncombed and hanging in tangled masses to
his shoulders, face haggarl and unshaven.
head bowed down, and eyes rowing restless
ly from object to another, and scarcely ever
fastened upon the face of man, uncarine and
uncared for, he moves dejectedly along with
the crowd as ifhis worldly hopes had fallen
from him like so many withered leaves. His
story, as / heard it from person who is fa
milar with the circumstances, is long and
sad one, but will be brief:
Little more than five years ago, this poor
unfortunate was a thriving merchant in a
New England city, honored by all who knew
him, well to do in the world, and with wife
and two daughters of seven and eighteen
years of age, enjoyed the comfort which sue
cessful enterprise h I'd scared to him. About
this time there was introduced in his family
circle one of his clerks, between whom aud
the eldest daughter an intimacy sprang up.
Suspecting nothing, no objection was made
to his society, but suddenly one morning he
was missing. lie had gone too far, and the
old story was re-enacted. He had won the
daughters affection, effected her ruin, and
deserted her to escape the punishment he
anticipated. Discovering her condition, the
young girl left home to conceal her guilt.
The mother, broken hearted at the shame
of ier daughter, was taken i'll and died. and
as if the hard of Providence was laid in
wrath upon them, the youngest daughter in
a few weeks after was also laid to rest be-
meath the chan ,el-stone. Only a little while
elapsed, and AN infant was one morning
found upon the river bank, with note pin
ned to its dress, containing its name. and n
few words of ponitenoe and farewell. Its
wretched mother had terminated her sorrow
by suicide. From that hour the father was
an altered man. Revenge became the only
object OF life, and forsaking his business, he
started in pursuit of the author of his misery.
Months passed without success, but he fin
ally learned that the young man, under an
assumed name, was in remote town in the
West, and, following with all haste, he there
found him. Both want of space and ability,
make 1t impossible for me to describe the
tel rible interview that resulted; but It an
pears that the seducer, far gone with the
consumption, was confined 70 his room, and
when the broken hearted man he had so
deeply wronged, abruptly entered and stood
before him his own terror and the fearful az
ony and denunciations of the almost maniac
father, so worked upon him that hemor
rhage Of the lungs was brought on, and he
died on the ensuing night. Since then, the
father has been The miserable wanderer |
have descrihed-"the world forgetting, and
by the world forgot" The only memento
OF the past, visible about him, is dirty cord
around his neck, which suspends a leather
case enclosing locket with the hair and por-
traits of his family. His home is among the
squalld tenements of the Five Points, his dai
iy wants are supplied by remnant of his
former property, but with hopes crushed,
ambition destroyed, a bitter past behind,
ana rayiess future, his use to society gone,
and he moves among men, human ruin
granite temple crumbled into sand"
r,s. L.,