Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1863-10-15
THE STRONG HEART.

a long file of girls were working at their noisy
looms Most of them presented the common
type of the factory girl, the independence,
the self-assertion the love OF snatches OF line
ry in the shape of necklaces and earrings, in
the middle of the dusty clothes, with their
bursts of merriment at every pause in their
routine. One girl was an exception. She
worked in a corner, told off by a necessary
angle of the building from the stands of her
companions. She preferred that situation,
and had selected it without opposition. She
was not better than her neighbors; she had
the ordinary calico gown, and the cap with
which the wise ones protected their heads
from the stuff flying about the room. If there
was any difference, her dress was more scru-
pulously clean and more precisely and primIy
fitted, and pinned more smooth and neat, than
the dresses of the other girls. But she was
clearly woman of higher cast; you saw it
in her turn of features, her expression, her
intercourse with her fellOw-wOrkers and the
manager. Although she was quite Young
woman, and not unusually skilled in her trade,
there was tacit respect paid to her, that I'M
conscious demonstration which often marks
the difference between inevitable Just SUI
premacy" and unwarrantable usurpatlon. No
one in the Mile End Mill accused Lofty Brown
of airs or resented her dignity and mill
hands are VIGOROUSLY shrewd Observers
They did not take to her much; they did not
like her over much: she was a woman to be
trusted and treated with Indifference at that
stage, by the many as beyond their compre-
hension and their instincts, and to be loved
engrossingIy by the few.
Yet Lofty was only the orphan daughter of
a mechanic, who had been rather remarkable
for his incapacty than anything else. She
how +o
tor for her faculties, because Lefty was born
a rising woman.
| would like to show you Lefty in the
physique before she leaves the factory this
night, as it happens, never to return. She is
not little sprtc of a woman, as it is the
fashion Of the day to find embodments of
latent power. | suspect the size of the lam
tern has really nothing to do with the
strength of the flame within Lefty was fair
and pale-so fair and pale that there would
have been something insipid about her per
son, had it not been thrown into a grand
mould. She was big woman, rendered or
ly slightly ungainly by her compressed dra
perry.
That night at the ringing of the factory
bell, Lefty sorted her loom, as she was wont,
in her orderly fashion, and went out slowly
andsingly, lingering behind the riotous troops
OF her companions, in order to be joined bv
George Ashe. There he was by her side, a
slight lad, more youthful-looling than Lefty
though he was her senior, with that ineffable
air Of refinement which some people call a
genteel address, and with one Of those bright
and spiritual faces, set in soft, dark hair, cur
ly hair, which we are driven to look on in
man with dim doubts and forbOdings
In a month from that date Lefty went
abroad with the Bridgcwaters, who, in ordi-
nary, accommodating phrase, had taken fancy
30 the superior mill girl. Lefty went as aid
to Mrs. Pcaston, to Mrs. Bridgcwater's maid,
to the head nurse of the young Bridgcwatcrs.
She got higher wages as an amphibious do
nestle than she could win working in the fac
tory. She would see the world and improve
herself, as the quiet young woman had an ar
dent desire to do, and her George was recon
c1led to the separation because he could trust
her, and he was as proud that she could com
mand these advantages as he was mortified
that they should 90 without his instrumental
ity, and not in his company.
The next time that we see LEFTY Brown Is
with other surroundings, under different
aspect The Brd@cwatcrs tour had been
protracted from months to years, and Lefty
had tasted Il little of the bitterness of hope
deferred; but that honorable purse of hers
was always growing heavier, aud that mind
and heart of hers better instructed anG
though George Ashc was too true not to want
her back to him, lie was compelled to submi
to circumstances If YOU were a light OBJ
server, you would scarcely know Lefty Brown
again-MiSS Brown nOw--in her plain, taste
full, ladylikc dress, acknowledged maid to the
young ladies, and tactotum to the hOusekcep-
l..
tress's hair, Lefty had learnt to dress her own
that pale brown hair without any of the red
of the chestnut u little too fair and cold, but
which formed, for all you might know better,
so fitting setting to the large finely fcatur-
ed, tranquil, sweet face.
Lefty Brown was in Italy when the next
event in her history occurred. The Bridge
waters were posting between Lcghorn and
Rome. They had Just cOurtcousv added to
their company sensible invalided Lieutenant
Colonel, with whom they had some little ac-
quaintance-a poor man who was travelling
for his health and eXcruciating himself with
the discomforts and loneliness of his life
They were in all tin. exigencies of the road,
when their courier was suddenly taken from
them by an official mandate in order to de
liver evidence on an unusual act of violence
which he had seen perpetrated when he was
travelling with the illustrous Inglese, who
had been his last employer
The affair was not very formidable The
little posting town, with its grey gateway and
gaudy shrine, where the arrest took place,
afforded ut least decent accommodation for a
halt.
How Lefty ran up and down, how she spun
out her stock of Italian, how she unroped
boxes and mclasped cases, found this clothes
brush and that spirit lamp, and soothcd the
disconsolate family and their more disconso-
late satellites, who, Of course as IA rule cop
led their principals, is Il matter which fairly
battles all description.
The Colonel was an admirCr of dispatch
and ingenuity he had learned their benefit
in his military shifts. He pulled his grizzled
mouStache in admiration of this young wom-
an. She was more valuable than Joachim, if
anybody could be more than all important:
and whereas Joachim was ugly as a babOOn,
and like galvanized figure tucked into
skin of brown leather this Young woman was
handsome, was t-handed-which was t ne
Colonies definition of graceful; she had
spirit she had ability, she was fit to be a
general When Joachim was free and the
travellers had gone their way, reached their
destination, and were settled in different
quarters of the Eternal City, the first time
the Colonel had an attack Of chronic aguc,
he sent his landlady who on holidays display
ed the richest mass of black hair and the
heaviest gold earring in the locality, with his
respects and apologies aud an earnest sole
itation that Mrs. Bridgewater would spare him
Miss Brown to preside over his soup and chloe
olate to see that he was not poisoned, to read
his Times to him, and prevent him from going
u L