The Vermont transcript. [volume] (St. Albans, Vt.) 1864-1870, 1867-08-02

lation, she once more entered the gate.
Then, walking quickly, though tremb-
lingly, up the tagged pathway, ascend
ing the marble steps with knees almost
lostling against each other, and pass
ing through one of the church doors,
left aiar, into the spacious vestibule,
in another instant she had knocked an
exceedingly faint knock at the door of
the pastors study.
Who was she2 What was the cause
of her agitation
In plain words, she was woman of
the town, and had been well-known to
the police of Abbeville for many year
as the worst and most abandoned
character of the kind that had ever
come within Their notice. She was no
longer young. She no longer retained
one vivid trace of beauty which,
thirty years ago, had been remarkable
Her history, up TO week previous to
the hour which we have been chronic
ling is the history Of thousands She
had gone through every grade Of sin,
from the ecstatic pinnacle of that first
yielding moment of credulons maiden
hood, which so dissemblcs virtue, to
those unnatural and nasty depths in
which the destroyed becomes the de-
stroyer. She had commenced by be-
ing the dove, very lovable, innocent,
tender, and sweet. She had ended by
becoming hawk, feeding upon doves,
and finding q music i'll their moaning
Had the communicates of the Church
of ST. Timothy, who, that Saturday
afternoon, had seen her lingering near
the graveyard, known or suspected
one-hundredth part of the ruin Mary
Smith Chat was the woman's name,
had wrought, they would have handed
her over to an officer and seen her
lodged in the nearest station-house,
rather than have had her crouch with
in arm 's-length of one of their bios
soming children.
She was the woman who now stood
knocking at the door of the pastors
study
The Rev Theodore Nelson was at
) once, one Of the most learned of di-
vines, and one Of the simplest and best
! Of men. lie had been pastor Of the
Church Of ST. Timothy for nearly half
, century, and was now almost seven
B. ty years OF age A purer man, man
who none loathed and shuddered at,
) whatever was coarse or vile, never
breathed. The vulgar felt uncomfor-
table in his presence, and blushed to
meet his eve. The contaminated
shrank from him as much as he shrank
from contamination. His was not the
easy abstemiOusness of forty tenn
peramant. His heart was warm, gen
erous, naturally impulsive. In his
youth he had been passionate in his
attachments, and imperious aud hot in
temper But he had always remained
pure in thought, and word, and deed
and this anomaly for purity is an
anomaly in men-had bestowed won
derful spirituality upon the beauty of
his old age. Upon his brow were ac-
crued the virtue and innocence of a
long life. Did he possess anything of
that look in childhood, the picture of
his features at that springtide of life
had been taken for that of an ideal
face, something like the one which
beams pensiyely upon us from out our
imaginations of what the child-Jesus
looked like, whilst He was about his
Fathers business in the temple. All
through his experience Of seventy
years; all through his labors among
prisons, MISSIONS hospitals, and asyl-
ums in some of the inmates of which
he had, through calls OF various ma
ture, become interested from time to
time, he had never realized that such
an amount of sin could exist in one
single human heart as that which sur
viyed in the heart of the unhappy wo-
man who stood knocking feebly at his
study-door.
Feebly indeed-so feebly that he
had not heard her until now, although
she had knocked twice. She had
wiped her eyes dry with the ravelled
sleeves of her frock, and stood listen
ing with suspended breath. Then,
gathering all her courage together,
there was little enough lift, she gave
one zap more, little louder than the
other.
Come in" she heard voice say
But her hands trembled too con
fusedly to turn the door-knob, and she
fumbled about it i'll vain.
Then she heard steps. Immediate
ly the door opened, and she found her
self within two feet of the object Of her
visit. Not face to face, however, for
she held hers down, and the large sun
bonnet she wore enveloped it in shad
ow, and almost concealed it. As Mr..
Nelson lhe had refused all the degrees
the colleges had conferred upon him., j
inyoluntarily drew back in surprise,
she spread ont her hands in u sort of
trembling entreaty, and, passing over
the threshold, tottered toward sofa
that stood near the door, and seized
one of the sides for support. Mar
row as that threshold vas, she felt in
some obscure way, that, for her it had
the width OF all eternity for evil or for
god.
The door closed She was alone
with the minister He came toward
her with outstretched hand. She put
her own behind her; her head sank
still lower; she shuddered from head
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