Connecticut western news., 1871-09-01
A YACHTSMAN,S ROMANCE.

The London season was over, and con- siderable number of it's late celebrities were collected in various pleasant spots closely contiguous to the waters of the Solent. Blighted beings had repaired to Cowes, and shattered hearts to Ryde
 Gentlemen who were. in popular parlance, about done up" were enjoying themselves with an hilarity, that might have betokened the zenith of worldly prosperity and com mercial success, in different crafts belong ing to the pleasure fleet which covers the English Channel with animation during the months of July, August, and Septem- Der. Of all social phenomena there is none probably more curious than that thus stated by distinguished novelist: How is it that men whom in their palmy days l have seen haggard, careworn, and deject- ed by the simple fact that they are utterly and irretrievably ruined, suddenly become the most light hearted and jolliest of ma11- kind ?" The explanation probably is re- action reaction from the suspense soi anxiety to the certainty of despair. Or possibly the philanthropists who propose to themselves the extinction of impecunos
 ity at a modest profit of eighty per cent. might consider that the true raison detqe was to be found in the fact that these volatile human wrecks are blest with ex- pectations in the background, and. usually have reyersionary interest more or less available E'~.Flsh I" :~
 The scene is Ryde Pier, and the hour about 7:30 P. M. pretty spot, and by no means an unfavorable hour for visiting it. Like Melrose, Ryde Pier and the view which it represents may be visited with signal propriety by the pale moonlight or in the pale twilight. The eternal promen- ade on the pierhead, the perpetual accom- paniment of brilliant music and intermin- able scandal, the careless tide of demon strative tirtation-these thing gs are pleasant enough per SC, but they have, no doubt, a tendency to become monotonous. It is a very different thing, Ryde Pier after din- ner. You can secure society without crowd and company without effort. You may mediate sOtus, or solss cum sold you may Hlrt. And the prospect is not with out it's charm. There in the Solent is the squadron of dainty craft, their sails furled, still and motionless at anchor, the lamp fixed to their mastheads refecting itseli with quivering motion in the tide below and the whole effect being that of ma rIne illumination. A little further on, and you can see the line of light on the main lana and distinctly trace the terraces oi SOuthsea and Portsmouth. If you turn round you. will see full in your face the little town Of Ryde alive with gas, and the windows of the Victoria Yacht Club all aglow. Then. probably, to enhance the sentiment of the moment, the strains ot music steal upon you; and were it not that you are seasonably reminded of con- tingent rheumatic pains, you might be tempted to lapse into poetic reverie.
 MT. Jim Lawlesse, to address him at once by his familiar title, was scarcely a gentleman of a poetic temperan ent, yet from the prolonged mtentness of his gaze upon the waters, as he lounged across the railings of the pier, and the fact that he had suffered his cigar to become extin- guished in his hand, he might, for all one could have told to the contrary, been meditating a sonnet to his mistress eye brow, or be speculating deeply on the philosophy of the unconditioned. Of that little yacht yonder-the one nearest the shore, with it's tiny light twinkling from amid it's rigging-the Sea Fan was her name MT. Jim Lawlesse was temporary proprietor Jim's friends were in the habit of saying that, having made the land too hot for him, he had taken to the waters and there may have been reasons which rendered St. James, street slightly too public place for our hero. So Mir Lawlesse had accepted an invitation iron an old college friend to go on yachting trip in the Sea Fan. But the Sea Fan'i owner had been called away, and Mt. Law Jesse was the man in possession pro tenn A boat containing gentleman and twt ladies pulled to the pier, and Mir Lawlesse' attention was aroused The party hac come from the Petrel, about mile out