The Kenosha telegraph. [volume] (Kenosha, Wis.) 1860-1888, 1864-11-17

his goose again though he. be goose enough
himself, for that matter Well, well, if folks
will NEEDLE with things they don't UNDER
stand, they must pay their account with be-
ing done uncommon Drown, especially ifthey
come in old Blagden's way"
/ This was something like the substance Of
the conversation, as related to me about a
twelSemonth after it occurred, by Nicholas
Price, one OF the interlocutors my business
fln Poole being to ascertain if any ill-blood
fhad existed between Gibson and Blagden
how engendered, and how hot--inflamed-- -
Something turned the talk" Price said, to
Eother matters, and about two hours passed
1.-THE silent stranger, as he and others noticed
drinking hot brandy and water, as if it were
so much Watermelon all in minute, up
the said stranger speaks, says he's the cock
ney tailor they had been talking about, and
wants to know if it was positive true that
| Blagden was such swindling blackguard
| as they made out otIf so,' said the excited
| stranger, Il am ruined man My name
is Joseph Gibson. It is who have taken
the Stape Hill Farm; and if what you have
said is trne may God do SO to me and more
also but Twill have the villain heart's4bood
before many months have passed ~ --s.
| Genuine fury, earnest passion, always i'm
| presses, rebukes men for a time to silence,
and no one spoke in answer. Price and his
companions were not DESTROYS that their con-
tidential chat with each other should be made
town talk of. Everybody disliked Blag
| den. but few would have chosen to make
lhiln their personal enemy what want
to know is, continued Gibson, who did not
appear to be exactly drunk, though he had
really tossed down his throat during those
two hours nine shilling glasses of brandy
and water-his speech, his legs being steady
firm fhe devil of drink, as frequently hap
pens, was mastered by the far mightier de
Dion of revengful rage)-"what want to
know, and will know, is whether or not the
stock and growing crops at Stape Hill Farm
were valued to Blagden at one hundred and
forty pounds p This fierce query was re
piled to by Mr.. Phillips. a master harness
maker at Poole, VINO had before spoken up
on the subject .'Fhat is Gospel truth, y
said he. Il am one of Ridges creditors, I'M
der the assignment which he made for the
henetit Of all Though some haven't accepted
| it,, and my name is to the receipt for the one
hundred aud forty pounds paid by Blagden,
just three weeks agone, for the stock and
crops on them acres of hungry sand which
he calls Stape Hill Farm A precions farm!
| II was plenty of money too Let me adj
wise the gentleman from London" continu-
ed Mr.. Phillips, in the very words he used,
~ well as his memory served him, 'that if
he have given three hundred pounds as some
say he have for what will not bring in more
than a hundred odd to throw up Che place
at once, and let first loss be last loss. AS
e l. L l. 4
very wild, foolish talk y
At hearing that, Gibson dropped back in
to his chair without speaking a word, mo-
toned person near bell to ring it, signed
to the answering waiter for another glass of
brandy and water and sat drinking till he
fell helplessly drunk upon the floor, and was
carried to bed 1t was late the next day
when he left the Roebuck, and he was new
er again seen in the house,
Gibson had mover been addicted to drink
and Ia ordinary circumstances, till of late
years, when niisfortunes gathering thickly
about hun, cankered his temper as it bowed
his form, as it blanched his hair-had been
man of generally placid demeanor, though
capable, when reused, of rushing into the
most violent extremes, This | ascertained
from his former neighbofs in Islngton. 1t
must not be forgotten either, that he had
set his life-more than his own, mis- childs
life-upon the desperate cast of success in
the farming experiment To play falsely
with such man, in such a mood of mind,
was playing with fire. o.. eiaaF-
Soiners and his wife managed to pacify
him for time by confident assertions that
the land was very fair land, and the stock, |
properly tended, would realize a profit upon |
the three hundred pounds. What he had
heard at the Roebuck was mere malicious |
gossip, nothing more. Thus heartened, |
Gibson persevered; working at such labor |
as he was fit for like slave. He had one
prime source of consolation, which could be |
no deception -Catherine's health improved |
wonderfully at Stape Hill; and could he
but manage to make both ends meet, he |
should be we'll content with his bargain.
That he soon found to be impossible. |
Wages, manure, horse-keep, his own do
mestic expenses-trifling as was the last
item--quickly ate uphis ridiculously insult
ficient capital. Stock, half fattened, was
sold at ruinous prices; and two months |
before Michaelmas, 1885, he, after looking
carefully and boldly into the state of his af |
fairs, was fain to recognize the terrible fact
that he must give upthe farm; and, with
scarcely a sovereign in his pocket, return to
dDgy, sitting London, with his now bloom
ing daughter; to seek their means Of el1ing
out miserable life, and die there. Cath
crime, soon as he, perhaps sooner. The
slightest hint of leaving Stape Hill .paled the
newly blown roses on her cheeks, one of
the reasons why being that she, on most fine
evenings met William down at the stie "
A. 10 fLo Tool,
well respected son of a building carpenter
and timber merchant, whose place of bust
ness was less than a mile distant from
Stape Hill Farm.i l'sg 7e.f,a4..r -,irj
Hope, as have somewhere read, springs
eternal in the human breast. That supreme
elixir, at all events, weIled up rapidly in
the fast falling springs Of Joseph Gibson''s
life, from a very simple fact, daily becom-
ing more certain, plain-namely, that about
forty acres of carrots, which had looked un-
promising, would yield a most abundant
crop; and carrots We're carrots that year
| was told, indeed when | went down, that
carrots, mangold, and such deep, striking
F., roots, could alonebe grown with a chance
of profit in the loose, sandy soil about there
This success induced Gibson to again go
infinitely over his accounts, and the result
this time was, that if Mr.. Blagden could be
persuaded to let the rent the whole twelve
months rent-stand over to the following
year, he might rub on, and eventually by
growing only root crops, pull through. But
if the retired attorney would insist upon be-
! ing psid the fifty pounds, the amateur agri-
culturist did not see how it would be posi-
BILE to get through the year whilst the crops
were growing /; hardly then. Still it might
be barely possible to do 50. u, 800.
| On the Goth of September, 1S45, Blagden
arrived from London on the previous day.
called al, Stape Hill for the years rent. He
came in one-horse gig, which, as he was
in the habit of doing, he had hired at the
Roebuck, Poole 1t. was growing dusk
when he reached the, place he stayed
about two hours and it was quite dark, exc