Holmes County Republican. [volume] (Millersburg, Holmes Co., O. [Ohio]) 1870-1895, 1871-09-21

The stroller beauty's garden through,
Bymany q wayward impulse led,
: sometimes is charmed by gold and blue,
d sometimes by brown and mantling red
sometimes proud dame and maiden small
. Please just the same, or not at all.
yl But when, remote from pleasures whirl,
!. ~ He sees, at homes sequestered shrine,
II The ardent, cheerful, guileleSs girl, -
or mortal mold, but soul divine
IL Too good, too beautiful to know
rI How fair her worth and beauty show.
Then all his rowing fancies pause,
Entranced by this Overwhelming grace;
al 1t rules him by celestial laws;
1t lights plendor in his face.
d 'Tis the best good that Heaven can give:
ell He wins it-and begins 10 live.
, ~
e lSMALLPIECE'S LEGACY
= A Story of Country Lawyer
When people wanted to get to tn,
+ office of M. .Smalipiece,, they wer'
: obliged to 60 up dirty street ant
then turn under dark and gloom,
, archway into a little open court
! where brass plate revealed th'
fact that the occupant of the ofiic,
or whose door it was nailed, was Mr.
Simon Smallpiece, Solicitor. Th,
office itself was pleasant and cheer
full when you once got inside of it
for its back windows opened upon :
sunny little bit of common greer
with soft grass and waving trees il
summer, and spotless pure with al
expanse of virgin snow in winter.
Il On many an afternoon had Mr.
Smallpiece, sitting at his old worm
eaten desk in the antique window
space, looked up from his work
and catching sight OF a bird hop
ping about among the rustline
leaves outside the open window, be
come lost in dreamy reverie, which
led him to waste whole hours in fol
lowing the unrestrained vagaries Of
idle thought, In fact, dreaming
was almost the only recreation
which Mr.. Smallpiece ever had now
He could remember, and that easily
enough, when he was not the child
less old man which life had left him
years ago. There had been a day
when cheerful home, graced with
all luxuries of life and rendered
sacred by its love of wife and daugh-
ter, was not the least of his earthly
possessions; and now his wife was
sleeping in the chuchyard yonder,
while his daughter -sf.sJ
| Worse even than deadp' ex-
claimed Simon Smallpiece, cleaning
his hand as he thought of her.
Worse even than dead. May my
curse go with her, and with the man
that robbed me of her.
And then he sat back in his leath-
ern- covered chair, biting the end of
his quill pen savagcly, and thought,
with bitterness in his heart, of the
day, so long ago, when she had come
to him holding Will Allen by the
hand, and when Will standing
proudly before him in the full no
bility of stalwart manhood, had
asked him for Nellie as his wife.
Mr.. Smallpiece remembered, too,
with a chuckle of eXultation, how
he had shown Will Allen to the door
at once, and forbade him ever to en-
ter his house again; how he had
himself returned to Will Allen all
the. foolish letters and keepsakes
which he ever had the audacity to
send Simon Smallpiece's daughter.
The old lawyer could not but ac-
knowledge to himself, as he sat
thinking of these things, that he
made somewhat of donkey of him
self after all; for Nellie had obstin
ately refused to marry the wealthy
suitor whom he had selected for her,
and had persisted in her silly at
tachment for this poor farmers son,
whom she ultimately ran away with
and married. But Simon Small
piece had sent his loudest curses
after them, and had never seen the
face of his only child from that day
to this. He would never forgive
her, and there was comfort in assur-
ing himself of that, at all events.
And so old Simon had lived alone
ever since, his temper soured against
all mankind, and his heart, if he
ever had one, which is doubtful,
chilled to thing of stone. He was
reputed rich, but few ever saw the
color of his money. His apartments,
in the upper part of the same build
ing with his office, were mean in the
extreme. His clothes were thread
bare, and his face was pinched with
the hard lines of avarice and selfish
ness. With no charity for the suf.
fering, with no feeling of kindli-
ness for the unfortunate, with his
heart closed to every appeal from
womanly tenderness or childish in
nocence, Simon Smallpiece avowed
himself the enemy of the world, and
passed his life in picking quarrels
with it. .l .ea- ..l-
One lazy afternoon, Mr.. Small
piece, CHANGING to look up from the
misty depths Of long chancery bill
in which he was just then submerged,
caught sight, through the open win
dow, of little child standing upon
the step of a house on the opposite
side of the common. There was
nothing interesting to Mr.. Small
piece in children. AS a general
rule, he hated them; but as he hap
pened to glance at this wee little la
dy, standing so plump and rosy,
upon the doorstep, she suddenly
clapped her chubby little hands to-
gether and gave such a joyous
scream of delight that Simon act
ually smiled. Yes; he did; and it
was something he had not done for
a very long time.
Looking in the direction in which
the child was gazing, he saw man
clad in the dress of a workman,
coming across the common. And
this person, when he came to where
the child was standing, caught her
up high above his head with little
laugh, and bringing her down again
into his arms, kissed her. iFA
Whether Mr.. Smallpiece's heart
was a trifle more tender than usual
just then, l can not say; but it
seemed to him there was something
in the movement of the workman
very pleasing and pretty. He re-
membered a time when he was wont