Shenandoah herald. [volume] (Woodstock, Va.) 1865-1974, 1869-01-28
She is Dying.

the room is fragrant with the sweet
breath of the Southern flowers large milk
white African lilies-roses, nightingale
would stoop to Worship cape jessamines
and camelias with their large glossy
leaves.
Through the open easement steals the
faint. musical Jingle of playing fountains ),
and the light tempered pleasantly by rose
curtains of embroidered satin, kindles up
gorgeous old paintings with a halo bright
as rainbow. 1t is as if fresher sunshine
were falling earthward on the bower of
beauty.
The canary sings in his gilded cage
her canary and the mocking-bird raises
his clear notes higher and higher on the
perfumed air.
Why do you clench your hands until
the nails draw the rich rosy blood through
the thin quivering sking Why do you
grind your teeth together and hiss be-
tween them that one word, hush? It's a
beautiful home, [ am sure, and that lady,
with her hand upon her bosom, is fair as
any dream vision of the painter.
Surely nothing could be purer than that
broad high brow; nothing brighter than
those curls.
And she loves you too! All, yes any
one can read that in the deep violet eyes,
raised so tenderly to your own. All, that
is it; your young wife loves you.
She linked to yours the existence of an
angel when she knelt beside you at the
marriage altar and placed her hand in
yours.
For twelve long golden summer months
an angel has walked or sat by your side,
Or slept in your bosom.
You know it No mortal woman ever
made your heart bow before purity SO
divine!
No earthly embrace ever filled your soul
with the glory beyond the stars; no earth
ly smile ever shone so unchangingly above
all 1noisome things as you earth worms
call care and trouble. She is an angle,
and other angels have been singing to her
in the long days of this pleasant June
time.
"Hush," you say, you can't shut the
anthem notes of heaven from those unseal-
ed ears I! Louder. lighter, swell the
hymns of the seraphs, brighter grows the
smile on your young wife's lips.
She whispers: Dearest, I'm almost
home, and you will come by and by, and
l am going to ask God to bless you!
= But you cannot hear it-you turn away,
and the big tears gather in the violet
eyes.
You had held her on your BOSOM all
day-all night; are you tired /? But you
can't answer Closer-closer you clasp
the slight, fair figure painfully you press
your lips to the cold brow-Carrie is
dead %
What is it to you that the sunshine is
bright ? what that its cheerful rays fall on
the broad lands-our lands What is it
now that she can walk on them no
more? And what is death-her death I?
Few people know her; no vicepresident
must be chosen to fill her place no nation
will raise monument to her memory =
But she vas yours-great God of-your
all.
No-yours and Gods; and your year Of
JOY is over, and she rests on His bosom
now in Heaven.
They have dug grave for her. Spring
flowers brighten over it, and the green
grass smiles with daises and violets. You
60 there, and sigh and pray, and ask God
if you, 600, may come home and when
no answer comes, your bright heart rises
up in bitterness, and with the bold, wick
ed words upon your tongue you pause, fer
your guardian angel looks down from
Heaven and whispers-"Hush p
How Much, MARIN We clip the fol-
lowing from an exchange. We advertise
nightly visitors of dry goods clerks to be-
ware A clerk in dry goods store retir
ed one night, having for his bed-fellow an
acquaintance dating back to school days.
Our informant slept in the next room adj
joining, the door of which was partly
open. In the middle of the night be was
awakened from sleep by hearing the clerk,
in loud voice, exclaim, How many yards
did you say you wanted, marin? Three
yards is enough and the next thing heard
a tearing noise, and the bed-fellow of
the clerk shouted out, What are you do
ing lyon have torn my shirt from top to
bottom. The poor dreamer imagined him.
self in his store waiting on lady custo-
mer. who wanted three yards Of Calico
The shouts of merriment which the event
created can we'll be imagined.
We heard the other day good one on
John Check, our former squire, who al
ways had his eyes cooked both ways for JUS
tice and perhaps for Sunday. 1t seems he
had fined an Irishman, who having used a
little too much of the craythur, was fool
ish enough to let the craythur use him.