Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1860-05-31
For the Yorkville Enquirer.
LETTERS FROM A FATHER---No. 8.


Messrs. Editors: The, fishing party,@I men.
toned in my last, came off on Thursday, and
the young folks seem to have had good time Of
lit. was in hopes that they would catch long
string of fish, for breakfast on Friday morning;
but, bless you, they didn't bring single one
home with them. The girls, all of them except
Jane, suggested that they did not fish for the
fish in the water; and that ought not to have
had any such gastronomic. expectations. Jane
smiled faint and rather sickly smile, and looked
off to one side, but said nothing. Jane is just
now in that .unenyiable stage of her existence
with the last rose of young maiden hood
blooming on her cheek, and the first "crow. foot''
wrinkle of old maiden-hood beginning to peer
dimly from between her eyebrows-when the
"ashen and SOBER hopes that fit over her heart
seem more like the "swift, silent" shadow Of the
noon.cloudlet passingoverfelds, than the fresh,
merry spa&le of the sunbeams reflected from
morning dews. mean; this is an unenviable
condition, when the heart is ful, and there is
none to woo. -.
The party had arranged to take tea with my
dear wife, when they returned in the evening
We need not follow them through their days
sports and 'love-making for. they ell acknowl-
edged this to have been their business. They
came back most of them, gay ifnot really happy.
One of them, especially, was indeed happy. I
could tell it from the suffusion Of q. new grace
iu all her movements, and a mellower beauty
in her features, derived from o new born impulse
within the heart. This was Eiza-my gay, idle,
thoughtless, Eliza. I surmised mt once that
Henry had courtsd, her at the fishing party.
loved her more than ever, now that for, the first
time thought seriously. of losing her and
felt in my heart, that as great q trouble and
burden as, she had been and was, could not
give her up without a pang The parents heart
never wholly surrenders its love for the child,
no matter how ,dissipated, or frivolous, or vain.
My surmises we're fully verified when after tea
Henry requested ne to walk out with him, and
asked me for Eliza's hand. gave her up to
some extent willingly, even gladly; for Henry is
the son of one Of my most esteemed friends, and
I was desirous to preserve the hitherto intimate
relations of the two families. But, then, must
confess to some serious and fearful misgivings
as to the future Of the young couple. Henry is
not talented bynature his scholarship is scanty
enough; and his business education has been
entirely neglected. Eliza is no better. She
cannot cook; she cannot cut out aud sew; she
cannot supervise household affairs; she never
washes her daintiest embroidered handkerchief;
pork, beef and cabbages, cooking, smell offensive
ly to her; and, indeed, the beginning and end
of real wfe's sternest duties are to her intoler-
able. Now think of a couple like these, whose
whole life has been round Of pleasure, with
ten or fifteen thousand between them to begin on,
starting out on q course Of married usefulness
and prosperity. WHAT'S likely to be their fate?
cannot think Of discussing this question in
the present letter. You must allow me space
for the indulgence of my feelings now for what
has been done cannot be undone; and Henry
and Eliza are even already man and wife. They
were in haste to be off on a!bridal tour to the
North; so they married very early Monday
morning, and took the train by sunrise, and
will summer in colder cline. They appear to
love each other much; and hope and joy beamed
from every feature. Buttheir hope and love, I
fear, are both blind for they have neither look
ed far into the future, nor studied each others
disposition and qualities very closely. Let us,
however, not conjure up any imaginary and i'm
possible ills to obstruct their path of life.
My house has now one less inmate and feel
the loss ofEliza as sensibly as I did the loss OF
my first jaw-tooth. She has given away her