The home journal. (Winchester, Tenn.) 1858-188?, 1874-05-21
THE CURFEW HEROINE.

THE CURFEW HEkOlNE.
1t lacked but half an hour Of Curfew
toll. The old bell-ringer came from
under the wattled roof of his cottage
stoop, and stood with uncovered head
in the clear, sweet scented-air. He had
grown blind and deaf in the service, but
his old arm was as muscular as ever
and he who listened this day marked no
faltering in the heavy, metalec thro S
of the cathedral bell. Old Jasper had
lived through many changes. He had
tolled out his notes of mourning for
good Queen Bess and with tears
scarcely dry he had rung the glad It'd
ings of the coronation of James; Charles
the First had been crowned, reigned
and expiated his weakness before all
England in Jasper's time and now he,
who under his army held all the com
monwealth in the hollow Of his hand,
ruled as more than monarch, and still
the old man, with the habit of long
life upon him, rang his matin and sor-
row.
jasper stood alone now, lifting his
dmmed eyes up to the softly dappled
sky.
The walls of his memory seemed so
written over-sO crossed aud re-crosscd
by the annals of the years that had gone
before, that there seemed little room
for anything in the present. Little
rocked he that CromwelPS spearsmen
were camped on the moor beyond the
vilage-that Cromwell himself rode
with his guardsmcn league away ;
he only knew that the bell that had
been rung in the tower when William
the Conqueror made curfcw law, had
been spared by Puritan and Round
head, and that his arm for sixty years
had never failed him at cvcntide.
He was moving with slow step toward
the gate, when woman came hurriedly
in from the street and stood beside him
lovely woman, but with face SC
blauchcd that it seemed carved in the
whitest of marble with all of its round
ness and dimples. Her great solemn
eyes were raised to the aged face il
pitiful appeal, and the lips were form
ing. words that he could not under
stand.
"Speak up, lass. am deaf, and can
not hear your Clatter.
The voice raised, and the hand
clasped and unclasped, and wrunt
themselves together, palm and palm.
"For Heavens sake, good Jasper, d.
not ring curfew to night"
"What ma ring curGew Ye must b
daft, lassie"
"Jasper, for sweet Heavens sake, 70
my sake, for one night in all your Ion
life forget to ring the b II i! Fail thi
once and my lover shall live, Hhor
Cromwell says shall die at 'cnrfew tol
Do you hear ?-my lover, Richard Ten
pie. See, Jasper, here is money
make your old age happy. 1 sold m
Jewels that the Lady Maud gave me
and the gold shall all be yours for oil
curfow."
"Would ye bribe me, Lily De We're
Ye're changeling. Ye've ma the bloc
of the Plantaganets in ye're veins
your mother had. What corrupt m
bell-ringer under her majesty, GOO
Queen Bess Not for all the gold tn
Lady Maud could bring me What
your lover TO me?, Babes have be-
born and strong men have died befo
now az the ringing of my bell. Aw
ava p
And ont on the village green, wi
the solemn shadows of the linde
lengthening over it, strong man await
the curfew to toll for his death.
stood, handsome, and brave, and tall
taller by an inch than the tallest pix
man who guarded him.
What had he done that he shou
die? Little it mattered in those da
when the sword that the great Gro
we'll welded was so prone to fall, vi
he or others had done. He had be
scribe to the late lord up at the cast
and Lady Maud, forgetting that N
must WOO, and woman must wait, i
given her heart to him without the a
ing while the gentle Lily De We
distant kinswomaD, and poor compan
to her, had, without seeking, found
treasures of his true love, and held tn
fast. Then he had joined the arr
and made one of the pious soldi
whose evil passions were never stir
but by sign or symbol of popery.
scorned woman's hatred had reac
him even there. Enemies and d
plots had compassed him about
conquered him Tonight he was to
The beautiful world lay as a v
picture before him. The dark @,
wood above the rocky hill where r,
Hood and his merry men had DIV
the frowning castle with its drawbri
and square towers the long stretc
moor with the purple shadows upor
the green, straight Salks of the villi
the birds overhead, even the daisie
his feet he saw. But, all more viz
than all, he saw the great red sun
its hazy veil lingering above the t
as though it pitied him with more
human pi'yl
He was a Gpd fearing, and God
ing man. He had long made his ,
with heaven. Nothing stood bet
him and death-nothing rose plet
between him and those who we're t