The Vermont transcript. [volume] (St. Albans, Vt.) 1864-1870, 1865-07-21

Iney parted, Hui lnc yours IOleu
on, one after the other. In the world
strange changes happened, and there
were deaths and marriages and births.
Old faces went, new ones came. In
ventions set the world ablaze, Wars
\ and rumors of wars shook the earth.
In the prison, onemonotonous routine
divided the days, and nights were on
ly marked by the exchange of sun for
gas-light
John Rodman's soul was crushed:
considered felon by ell, he grew to
feel like one--to shrink from the eyes
of honest men, and to have no hope
on earth or in heaven save those prison
walls.
Sometimes he said, "Ten years will
end at last And then he asked him
self, For what? My If is wasted.
| cannot begin again"
And untimely SHOWS fell upon his
hair, and wrinkles drew themselves up
on his brow And when Mt last the
prison doors were opened to let out
the poor wronged man, he felt older
than most men at fifty. He stood in
the world without cent, or decent
clothes, or any place to hide his head,
and bowed beneath the sense of his
great wrong and bitter loss.
There had come out with him an old
thief, one of his jail companions--a
bald bold man, with a spot of gratitude
somewhere in the midst of his heart
He followed John Rodman and came
up to him in lonely place, at the
bleak corner of road, where he stood,
puzzled, trying to collect his thought
Il say what are you going to do 2"
he asked.
Dor said John, gloomily Earn
an honest living, or hang myself"
Don't let 'em know you've been in
there, said the thief, pointing prison
ward, cor you can't do the first thing;
and before YOU put your neck in a
moose, come to our place You1l find a
friend there and welcome. You was
good to me in there, and like you,
and he ended with an OATH
John Rodman shuddered. He
knew what haunts that man made his
home in, and horrible dread of him
self fen upon him. He had been called
n thief SO long that it seemed quite
possible that the actual life of one
might lie before him. He grew cold
from the heart out. 81 shall earn All
honest living somehow, said he. "All
want is bread, and shelter. Good
bye
Goodbye" said the thief. Its 8
ALLEY, if you want to come there
you may yet.
And they parted John Rodman
taking the road toward New York.
His first thought, when he quite I'M
derstood that he was free, was of Eva.
Not that he might WOO and win
her after ten years of disgrace, but
only to see her once and tell her how,
through all those years. he had re-
membered and worshipped her. He
hardly guessed himself, how he had
changed. The brooding, hang-dog
look, the thin, bent frame; the unkempt
locks that blew about his face; the hat
with hole in it; the ragged knees and
elbows. A squalid, beggarly wretch
who, when he last looked in q mirror
had been spruce young fellow, hand
some as a picture.
So he toiled on towards her city
and, when faint with hunger, found q
horse to hold or Job to do and earnt
pittance.
So, when he crawled into town, h,
had shilling, and being faint, slunl
i into restaurant hard by to get {
glass of ale. 1t was place frequenteo
= by Germans, and with sanded floor
and bare pine tables. But it had it
. elegancies, too. And opposite the Ia
= bic where John Rodman sat hung {
square mirror and two gaudy prints
4 John looked at one of these, then n
a the other.
4 At last towards the mirror.
J. He thought it was a window anc
t that man was looking at him through
: it, at the first glance.
: "What an Unlocking dog" though
d John. 81 wouldn't trust him. How
o he stares, poor wretch; he don't seen
h human. Ali OH my God! u IS
myseV"
|. 1t was an awful moment. Dealt
n has no more fearful pang. That mis-
cradle creature was John Rodman--
N was the being of whom he said 81
That-that that l