The Placer herald., 1873-12-06
LUKE.
I'm the Colorad do Park, 1s78.)
BY BRET HARTE.

| Wots that you're readin'? IA novel; A
novel-well darn my skin!
| You man grown and bearded and histin'
such stuff ez that in
Stuff abe ut gals and their sweethearts! No
wonder you re thin knife.
Look at me!-clar two hundred-and never read
one in my life
That's my opinion o novels. And ez to their
They belonged to the Judges daughter-the
Judge who came up last year
On account of his lungs, and the mountains and
the balsam O. pine and fir:
And his daughter-well she read novels, and
that what's the matter with her.
Yes she was sweet on the Judge, and stuck by
him day and night
Alone in the cabin up yer-till she grew Ike
ghost all white.
She wus only slip of thing, ez light and ez
up and away
Ez rifle smoke blown through the woods, bu
| she wasn't my kind-no way!
Speakin O. gals, dye mind that houss ez yor
rise on the hill.
mile and a half from Whites, and jist above
Mattinglys mill?
You do? Well now hdr's gal! What, you
saw her? Oh, come now. thar, quit!
She was only bedevlin you boys, for to me she
don't cotton one Bit
Now she's what call gal -ez pretty and plump
ez a quail;
Teeth ez white ez a hounds, and they'd &c
through tenpenny nail;
Eyes that can snap like cap. So she asked
to know whar was hid.
She did. o, it's jat like her sass, for she's
peart ez Katy-dld.
But what was I talking Of 20, the Judge and
his daughter she read
Novels the whole day long, and l reckon she
read them abed, t.
And some times she read them out lond to the
Judge on the porch VIII re he sat
And twas how Lord Augustus said this, and
how Lady Blanche she said that
But the sickest of all that heerd, was yarn
that they read bout a chap,
Leather stocking" by name and hunter chock
full o the greenest o sap;
And they asked me to hear but l says Miss
Mable, not any for me;
When likes kin sling my own lies, and that
chap and l shouldn't agree
Yet some how or other she was always sayin'
brought her to mind
OF folks about whom she had read, or suthin be-
like of that kind,
And thar want no end o. the names that she
give me that Summer up here,
Robin Hood, Misunderstanding, Rob Roy"
%, tell you, the critter was queer.
And yet ef she hadn't been spilled, she was
harmless enough in her way,
She could jabber in French to her dad, and they
said that she knew how to play,
And she worked me that shot-pouch up thar
which the man doesn't live ez can use,
And slippers-you see 'em down yer-ez would
cradle an lnjn's pappoose.
Yet along O. them novels. YOU see she was vast
in and mopin away,
And then she got shy with her tongue, and at
last had nothin' to say;
And whenever l happened around, her face it
was hid by book
And it want until she left that she give me ez
much ez look.
And this was the way it was. 1t was light when
kemu here
To say to 'em all good-by for reckoned to go for
deer
At sun up the day they left SO shook 'em all
round by the hand,
Cept Mabel, and she was sick, ez they give me
to understand
But jist ez passed the house next morning at
dawn, some cne
Like little wave O. mist, got up on the hill with
Miss Mable it was, alone-al wrapped in a man
tie o. lace
And she stood there straight in the road, with a
touch O. the sun in her face. .s.
And she looked me right in the eye--Id seen
suthin' like it before
When hunted wounded doe to the edge O. the
Clear Lake shore,
And / had my knee on its neck, and jist was
raisin' my knife,
When it give me look like that, and--well it
got off with its life.
1--WE are going to-day, she said, land Thought
l would say good-by
To yon in your own house. Luke-these woods,
and the bright, clear sky!
You We always been kind to us, Luke, and papa
has found you still
AS good as the air lie breathes, and wholesome
as Laurel Tree Hill
"And we'll always think Of you, Luke, as the
thing We could not take away;
The balsam that dwells in the woods, the rain
bow that lives in the spray.
And you II sometimes think of me, Luke, as you
know you once used to say, lf a.
rifle smoke blown through the woods, mo-
ment, but never to stay"
And then we shook hands. She turned, but a.
suddent she tottered and fell, D.. ....I ...-
And caught her sharp by the waist, and held
her minit-we f'
1t was only mint, you know, and ez cold and
ez white she lay -,, ....,.......
Ez a snowflake here on my breast, and then
well, she melted away
And was gone And there are her books;
but / says not any for me,
Good enough may be for some, but them and !
mightn agree. ae s-.r..
They spilled a decent gal ez might hev made
some chap good wife,
And look at me! clar two hundred-an6 never
read one in my life! r. t--n
...e...'3 d. Scr1ner's Aonttly. IS
1.....- l g