The Evansville journal. [volume] (Evansville, Ind.) 1866-1870, 1867-02-27

It was a hard and bitter life. 1t
CALLED me, when | rode through the
village, to see the peasant-children
shrink away from me. | have seen
old women cross themselves stealthily
as I passed them by. Strange reports
had gone forth about me; and there
were those who whispered that | had
given my soul to the Evil One as the
price of my cousins heritage. From
boyhood | had been dark of visage
and stern of manner; and hence, per-
hans. no woman's love had ever been
mine. I remember my mothers face
in all its changes of expression; but
[ can remember no look of affection
that ever shone on me. That other
women, beneath whose feet / laid my
heart, was pleased to accept my hom-
age, but she never loved me; and the
end was treachery
| had now grown hateful to myself,
and had well-nigh begun to hate my
feIlow-creatures. when feverish de-
sire seized upon me, and [ pinned to be
back In the press and throng of the
busy world once again, / went back
to Paris, where / kept myself aloof
from the court, and where an angel
took compassion upon me.
She was the daughter of an old
comrade, a man whose merit had been
neglected, whose achievements had
been ignored, and who sulked In his
shabby lodging like rat in hole,
while all Paris went mad with the
=, 4
lacqueys were trampling one another
to death in the Rue Quincampoix.
The only child Of this little cross
grained old captain of dragons was
an inearnate sunbeam, whose mortal
name was Eveline Duchalet.
She loved me. The richest bless
ings Of our lives are often those which
cost us least. | wasted the best years
of my youth in the worship ola wicked
woman, who Tilted and cheated me at
last [ gave this meek angel but a
few courteous words-a little fraternal
tenderness 10, she loved me.
The life which had been so dark and
desolate, grew bright beneath her in
fuence; and | went back to Puy Yer
dun with fair young bride for my
companion.
All, how sweet change there was
in my life and in my home The
village children no longer shrank APP
palled as the dark horseman rode by,
the village crones no longer crossed
themselves; for a woman rode by his
side-a woman whose charities had
won the love of all those ignorant
creatures, and whose companionship
had transformed the gloomy lord of
the chateaa into, a loving husband and
gentle master. The old retainers
forgot the untimely fate of my cousin,
and served me with cordial willing
ness, for love of their young mistress.
There are no words which can tell
the pure and perfect happiness of that
time. | feltlike traveller who had
trayersed the frozen seas of an arctic
region, remote from human love or
human companionship, to find him
self on sudden in the bosom of a
verdant valley, in the sweet atmos-
phere ofhome. The change seemed
too bright to be real; and | strove
In vain to put away from my mind the
vague suspicion that my new life was
UuU SOnC uIGdIus
So brief were those halcyon hours,
that looking back on them now, it is
scarcely strange if I am still half in
clined to fancy the first days of my
married life could have been no more
than dream.
Neither in my days of gloom nor in
my days of happiness had | been
troubled by the recollection of An
dre's blasphemous oath. The words
which with his last breath he had
whispered in my ear were vain and
meaningless to me. He had vented
his rage in those idle threats, as he
might have vented it In idle execra-
tions. That he will haunt the foot
steps of his enemy after death is the
one revenge which dying man can
promise himself; and if men thus had
power to avenge themselves, the earth
would be peopled with phantoms.
/ had lived for three years at Puy
Verdun-sitting alone, in the solemn
midnight, by the hearth where he had
sat, pacing the corridor that had
echoed his football; and, in all that
time, my fancy had never so played
me false as to shape the shadow of
the dead q
Is it strange, then, if 1 had forgot
ten Andres horrible promise?
There was no portrait of my cousin
at Puy Verdun. It was the age of
boudoir art, and a miniature set in
the lid of a gold bonbonniere, or
hidden artfully in massive bracelet,
was more fashionable than a clumsy
life-size image, fit only to hang on the
gloomy walls of a provincial chateau
rarely visited by its owner. My cous-
ms fair face had adorned more than
one bonbonniere, and had been con-
cealed in more than one bracelet; but |
it was not among the faces that looked |
down from the panelled walls of Puy