Nashville union and American. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1868-1875, 1872-03-17
THE MAD HERMIT.
Love, Crime and RemOrse-A HOmaa.
tie Story and a Notable Poem.

tie Story and a Notable Poem.
twenty-five years ago, Franklin Elliot, |
Of ElktoD, Todd county, Kentucky, a |
wealthy, gifted and rising politician, fell in |
love with Miss Olive -, beautiful but |
treacherOus maiden, greatly his inferior in
intellect and social position. Despite the |
remonstrances of his friends and relations, |
Elliot persisted in his suit, and Olives |
faith was plighted him, though her heart |
was given, as the sequel showed, to young !
man from Charleston, South Carolina, |
named Shelby Bailey, gifted but poor. |
The rivalry between the two eliminated |
| in duel with rifles at twenty-five PAGES, |
and Bailey fell with a bullet in his |
brain. In falling he had palled a |
paper half way from the bosom of |
his coat. The still maddened slayer |
tore this paper from the grasp Of the corpse, |
hoping to find it a confessions that Olive de- |
| served afairer name for constancy than this |
fatal affair would give her; but, alas! 1t was,
on the contrary, letter from her to the
Carolinian, as fond to him as 1t was treach-
erous to his murderer. When the dead
body was discovered in the wood where 1t
lay Elliot had disappeared, and it was nearly
a year thereafter before his afflicted family
knew that he was wandering about Central
Europe with the brand of Cain upon his
brow and an undying remorse at bis heart.
Ever since the year 1850 or 81 there had
lived in secluded cave ten miles from Pc
ira, Saline county, Missouri, stern savage
looking man, sunburnt and with long gray
| locks, who, while procuring the necessaries
| of life by selling In town such game
| as he secured with his rifle, Stunned all ia
| e au,d
| before intruders near his wild retreat
with such forbidding looks as prevented
| nearer intrusion. The sMad Hermit" was
what they called him, and his history was
| a sealed book. On the 9th of last October,
a party of sportsmen from the town were
| assailed by a violent storm when IN the
neighborhood of the famous cave, and pre-
sumed upon the exceptional circumstance
to solicit shelter of the hermit. Finding
the rude door of the den unopened to their
knocking, they boldly forced an entrance,
and found themselves, says the account, in
an underground chamber which had the
appearance of having been enlarged by arti-
fetal means from a small hole to the size OF
perhaps twenty to twenty-five feet square
and ten or twelve feet high. The walls were
rocky, but not of solid rock, and by labor
it was possible to still further enlarge
| it. There was absolutely no furni-
ture in the recess, bOuldeTs and
inches in the wall being used fOl
the depositing of the few simple articles its
inmate possessed. These consisted Of
rife and accompanying articles, long,
broad, bowie-knife, which had evidently
been used as a kitchen knife; fishing
tackle, couple of skillets and pan, and
books! These last were the works of Shaks-
peare, Schiller, Addison and Sterne, the
poems of Spenser and Southey, and novel
called "Richard bearing" On the fiy-leaf
of the latter was inscribed "Compliments of
the author, NJ. d. Shepard, TO his friend
Franklin Elliot" Turning from these in
congruous literary treasures, the eyes OF the
invaders, now more accustomed to the din
gy light ofthe place, sought curiOusly for
some sign of the owners presence, and
found it, where, upon a pile OF
blankets and skins In a corner, lay
the body of the Hermit, cold and dead. To
ascertain that death had come naturally and
without apparent pain, was the work of a
few awful moments to the hunters; and
then they opened g tin box standing near
the body for such revelation as it might con-
tain. In it were deposited some old letters
and poem in manuscript.
Two of the letters were from j. ID. Reeves,
and old EllItOn friend of Elliot, warning him
against the arts of Olive. Another was the
letter from Olive which Elliot had
snatched from the grasp OF the dying
Bailey, and read as follows:
81 have lust got letter from Frank. 1t
was full of love to me, and Of abuse for that
old wretch, Reeves, who is always prying
around. He says that Reeves has been
writing to him that hs must not marry me.
shudder at the thought of marrying him,
but you say l must. He is rich and fool,
and you and 1 will not be separated. U,
why are we both poor?
The manuscript verses found in the box
are "On Life and bore the annexation:
81 wrote this, after mopiDg away year in
Switzerland, a fugitive from justice. Fool
that have been!'' Here they are:
IT'S time that should loose from life at last
This hearts unworthy longing tor thepast
Ere life be turned to loathing.
For love (at least this love of one for one,)
Is, at the ,st not all beneath the sun,
And at the worst tbs nothing
Not that of all the past / would forget
| One pleasure or one pain; cherish yetI
And would dishOnOr never,
All have felt. But, cherished though It be,
IT'S time nv past should set my future free
For LIES renewed endeavor
Not much Irev'rence that remOrse which flies
To desert caves, and bids its dupes desplEe
Themselves on whom its preys;
: | Wasting the worth OF life on worthless pain,
To make the future, as the past was, vain,
By endless self dispraise.
As though, forsooth, because a man is not
His self-made God, he needs must curse his lot
With self-cOntempt; as though
Some sdualid maniac, that with lifelong moan
Insults mans flesh and blood, with these has
| .-. .l.,t ooD 5of
Nor am I keen to urge that common claim
| On this world OF anOther-here for lame,
Which only grows on graves
| Or there for so much, purchaseable here
By earth's Joy stinted, of celestial cheer
: The stimulant Of slaves.
Not for reward, not for release from pain,
I But with a mans imperative disdatn
= OF all that wastes mans nature,
| Rise. O nv soul and reach to loftier things,
> Untrammeled BY this fOrid weed that clings,
: Stunning spirits stature
; | 7 was not horn TO sit with shrOuded head,
Piping shrill ditties to IN unburled dead
: While life'S armed host sweeps by.
: | hear the clarion call, the war-steed Neigh
The banner huttering in the winds free play,
The brave mans battle-cry
And am conscious that, when all things strive
'Tis shameful to sit still, would not live
Content with life lost
In chasing rhine own fancies through void air,
| Or decking forth ia forms or phrases fair
= | The miserable ghost
/ OF mortal Joy or pain. The ages roll
Forward and forward with them draw my sOal
Into times boundless sea.
| And to be glad or sad 1 care no more;
But to have done and to have been before
l cease TO do and be-
From the minutest struggle TO excel,
9 OF things whose mOmentary myriads dwell
q In drops of dew confnedj
To spirits standing on lifes tOpmOst STAIR
: Whose utterances alter worlds, and are
3 The makers Of mankind.
}, All things cry shame on lips that squande
I speech
In words which, If not deeds, are worthless each
Not here such words are wanted,
Where all bestils itself, where dumb things do
s By nObly silent action speak and go
r Forth to their fates undaunted.
9 Shame on the wretch who born man, fOregOes
o Mans trOubIOus birthright for brutes repost
f. Shame on the eyes that see
: This mighty universe, yet see not there
u Something of difficult worth man may dare
n Rro yrafy Ia IN and be.