Port Tobacco times, and Charles County advertiser. (Port Tobacco, Md.) 1845-1898, 1860-11-16
4 Gpon Sotrg*
From Sharpc's Magazine.
VENUS OVER TIE MONKS TOWE Err.
An OLD ygOgAN's STORY.

BY LOUIS SAND:

BY LOUIS SANDS.
Old letters, old papers, old manuscripts.
yellow and faded and worn and the hand
that boarded them here will touch them no
more forever. Dusty, scrawling epistles in
boys round-hand, gathered and tied up
together; bundles of yellow letters-arc
these my own careless, oH-hand answers to
letters penned in anxiety and uneasiness :?
And here are worn old MSS in hand
writing which shall never see again. |
take the freshest, and lay it before me,
smoothing out the tumbled paper. [ will
give it a name:
Venus OVER THE Monks TOWER
As the stream nears the sea it forgets the
brawling days over rocks and brambles, and
calmness come over it, [ draw near the
ocean, I am forgetting: only, as the end
approaches, the beginning remains; and
childhood seems to join itself to age, shut.
ting out the troubles that came between.
[ wrote the incidents which return to me
so clearly now, if haply they may warn some
one who reads OF the misery Of lightly be-
lieving evil, and the danger of hasty judg-
ment.
| remember then, one sunny evening very
long ago, when [ was a child, Nurse sitting
witli my iittie brother ofl az u fssr
while [ dragged tale after tale from her with
Unsuitable greediness !; how, from her roman
tic heroes and heroines, [ rambed off to my
own father and mother, marveling how.my
father, who was gray-headed, and, in my
eyes, an old, old man, came to marry my
mother, SO young and merry and beautiful;
but On this head Nurse was silent [ re-
member, toa, another evening, when ] ran
to her with a treasure [ had ferreted out of
some rubbish in a lumber-room- dusty
thing, all covered with cobwebs but held
it forth in tremor of excitement, crying
out that it was picture of one Of those great
soldiers she used to tell me about It was
the portrait of soldier, and she took it from
me gravely, and when she saw my mother
coming down the garden, hid it away in her
bosom. bidding me hush
Shortly after that we had birthday feast
in little half-ruined tower in the garden,
which we called the "NIonk's Tower" A
glorious place it was, whore we might 90 in
wet weather, where we might make any
amount of noise, where Nurse used to sit
and tell the tales [ loved ; and this evening
there were healths to be drunk, speeches
made, cake to be eaten and the fun was at
its hight when a message came to the Nurse
that we were to 60 in, for "a grand gentle
man from the wars was come. ="
The little one, as my brother was called,
cried out that he would not 90 but Nurse
gave us visions of scarlet cloth, glittering
eqaulettes, and all sorts of glories-none Of
which we were destined to see. The grand
gentleman wore black coat, with one sleeve
pinned up; and terribly shocked I was, in
my superior perception, when Totty crept
up to him and pulled at it, asking gravely:
"Where he kept his other arm
He laughed, and when he laughed, Totty
stole back to my side, staring at him fierce
ly. He had sunburnt face and thick
brown moustaches, and my mother seemed
glad to see him. She called him ''Cousin
Charles" and smiled and talked and looked
SO beautiful, that I was more attracted to
her than to the stranger. My father had
pushed back his plate, and was busy with
his pencil; for just at this time he had
mania for discovering perpetual motion he
had invented and taken a patent for some
shing which Nurse told US was very clever
indeed, and only one thing was wanting to
make it quite what he aimed at.
Nelly" said Totty, when we were in
the nursery, Il don't like him do you -?
He's ugly"
But [ was watching Nurses face as I
whispered Nurse, it is the portrait mau."
She stopped and kissed US both, saying
nothing don't think she liked him either.
The nursery was over my fathers dress
ing-room, and looked out upon the Monks
Tower. [ remember standing at the win
dow that night, watching the long Shadow
of the tower upon the gravel, and filing it
with ghostly inhabitants, till terror seized
me. and [ hurried into bed, covering myself
close, and shivoring.
I But the grand gentleman did not 60 away.
We were told to call him Cousin Charles:
and after while he used to follow us about
into the garden and try to make friends
Once he even came to the Monks Tower.
and began taking Totty on his knee, calling
him Master Trot.
ga