The New era. [volume] (Martinsburg, W. Va.) 1865-1871, 1865-10-26
THE RED DU-fRF.
4 LeDend NJ NeM York IN the cute"
Time.
ny WM. HENRY rECk.

=
in the now magnificent pleasure ground
which we call the Central Park of New
York. Isolated and bleak, in those days,
with no attempt at ornament upon its
rude walls, the old house had been I'M
tenanted for years, when Hugh Carr
bolt saw fit to make it his habitation.-
No one then living could say to whom
it belonged, or by whom it had been
built; though grayhaired men told that
it had sprung as from the earth unmade
by mortal hands, and fit only for the
lurking place of smugglers, desperadoes
or demons. The last man, within their
recollection, who had lived there before
Hugh Garrbolt made it his home, died
there alone; nor was he known to be
dead until a wandering hunter, demand
ing shelter at its iron-bound door and
prison-like windows, and receiving no
reply, forced an entrance from the rear
and after striking light with flint and
steel beheld human skeleton, clad in
tlecayiug leathern garments, seated in an
oaken chair in ghostly grimness.
Before this hideous figure was spread
upon table a goodly store of silver and
golden coins, which their owner, per-
chance, was counting when the hand of
death smOte him, sudden and sure. The
hunter was man of nerve, and did not
hesitate to appr( pirate the treasure and
though he did not fail to tell of what he
had seen in the chair he said not Il word
of what he had taken from the table,
the latter truth leaked out when the
hunter became man Of money, married,
and told his wife!
The honest burghers of New Amster-
dam, as it's first white settlers detiantly
persisted in calling New York, smoked
their pipes for three months in deep cog
itation and resolved unanimously that
the hunter was a tremendous liar, until
II tall, gaunt and evil-eyed man from
France set the town in an uprOar by de-
claring that he intended to penetrate to
the spot and make the house his abode.
From the very day that the hunter had
told his tale the stunned dwelling had
been called "The Skeletons House, "and
nourchin, however daring, had ventured
within Il nile of it and as for any sem
sible Knickerbocker's going there, the
the very idea was preposterous.
Hugh Garrbolt, with sheer that had
been growing his thin, hard face for six
ty years, defied all known and unknown
demons with scott that made the good
burghers' hair bristle over their heads,
and went alone to "'The House of the
Skeleton"
The burgers waited two days, and then
nodded through clouds of smoke that
Hugh Garrbolt was fool. But when he
returned on the third day with a bag of
coin so heavy that he staggered under it
the burghers opened their eyes and
whistled that Hugh Garrbolt wasa very
wise parsonage.
II searched about the place." said Carr
bolt to a score of listeners, rs his sheer
I'D 1ic 1inS SSoCI found
some musty papers which told me that
an old buccaneer had lived there, and
where to dig for this. dug these 2O,-
600 golden crowns from under the ta-
ble."
"But," said Hans Van Schleepcr, 'thc
inn-kecper, as he slowly filled his pipe,
''the skeleton ?'
as there" said Garrbolt. My dear
friends, you are all welcome to that J"
The burghers smoked several hundred
pounds of strong jamestown weed du-
ring the following week, and on the
eighth day resolved to claim the 10000
golden crowns for the township. But
Monsieur Hugh Garrbolt had disappear
eel, and with him went the crowns.
Twelve months rolled on and still the
skeleton of the dead buccaneer held grim
and unmolested watch over the table,
when young Albert Vandemeer paid it
a visit. Albert Vandemeer was the on
ly son of a most worthy and respectable
widow whose husband had paid the
great and final debt when Albert was
but ten years old.
Ten years more had passed, and though
the sad-hearted widow held her head
droopingly, as she thought of the past,
her soft eyes sparkled with joy as she
yazed upon her manly son. Kind, gen.
erous, handsome, and atfectionate Al
bert, with his tall, 1.-THE frame, keen
blue eyes, and bounding step never paced
the street ungreeted by gossip, glance or
smile from the rosy damsels that festoon-
ed the windows like living garlands OF
beauty ON either side.
But the good burghers and their better
wives shook their heads as he stepped SO
yaily, and said he was by far too daring
as had been his father, who lost his life
in trying to swim through Hell Gate
without putting out the fire of his pipe ;
an exploit that extinguished pipe and
life forever.
One fine day some phlegmatic youth,
who envied Albert for his famous cour-
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