Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1874-04-23
THE HEROINE OF THE CURFEW.
BY MATILDA NJ. TURNER.

BY MATILDA NJ. TURNER.
IT lacked but half an hour of curfew
toll The old bell-ringer came from under
the waited roof of his cottage stOOp, and
stood with uncovered head in the clear,
sweetscented 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, metallic throbs OF the Cathe-
dral 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 tidings of the coronation of
James, Charles the First had been
crowned, reigned, and eXpiated his weak
nesses before all England in Jasper's
time; and now he who under his army
held all the Commonwealth III 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
curfew.
Jasper stood alone now, lifting his
dimmed eyes up to the softly-dappled sky
gathering but a faint sense of the lovely
scene or of the incense-freighted air.
The walls of his memory seemed so
written over-so crossed and recrossed by
the annals Of the years that had gone be-
fore-that there seemed little room for
anything in the present. Little rocked
he that Cromwell's spearsmen were
camped on the moor beyond the village
that Cromwell himself rode with his
guardsmen but a league away; he only
knew that the bell had been hung in the
tower when William the Conqueror made
curfew law, had been spared by Puritan
and Roundhead, and that his arm for
sixty years had never failed him at even
tide.
He was moving with slow step toward
the gate, when woman came hurriedly
in from the street and stood beside him.
q lovely woman, but with face so banched
that it seemed carved in the whitest of
marble with all of its rOundness and dim
Piles. Her great, solemn eyes were raised
to the aged face in pitiful appeal, and
the lips were forming words that he could
not understand.
"Speak up, lass. l am deaf, and cannot
hear your clatter."
The voice raised and the hands clasped
and unclasped, and wrung themselves to-
gether, palm to palm.
For Heavens sake, good Jasper, do
not ring curtew tonight"
What, no ring curfew! Ye must be
daft, lassie"
"Jasper, for sweet Heavens sake, for
my sake, for one night in all your long
life, forget to ring the bell Fail this once
and my lover shall live, whom Cromwell
says shall die at curfew toll. Do you
hear?-my lover, brave Richard Temple.
See, Jasper, here is money to make your
old age happy. l sold my jewels that the
Lady Maud gave me; and the gold shall
all be yours for one curfew"
"Would We bride me, Lily De We're?
Ye're a changeling. we've ma the blood
of the Plantagenets in ye're veins as your
mother had. What! corrupt me, bell
ringer under Her Majesty, Good Queen
Bess Not for all the gold that Lady
Maud could bring me! What is your
lover to me? Babes have been born and
strong men have died before now to the
ringing of my bell. Ava, awa'r
And out on the village green, with the
solemn shadows of the lindens lengthen-
ing over 1t, strong man awaited the cur
few to toll for his death He stood hand
some and brave and tall-taller by an
inch than the tallest pikeman who guarded
him.
What had he done that he should die
Little it mattered in those days, when the
sword that the Great Cromwell welded
was so prone to fall, what he or others
had done. He had been scribe to the late
lord up at the castle; and Lady Maud,
forgetting that man must WOO and woman
must wait, had given her heart to him
without the asking; while the gentle Lily
DE We're, distant kinswoman and poor
companion to her, had, without seeking,
found the treasures of his true love- and
held them fast. Then he had joined the
army and made one of the piouS soldiers
whose evil passions were never stirred
but by sign or symbol of Popery. But
scorned woman's hatred had reached him
even there. Enemies and deep plots had
comprised him about and conquered him.
Tonight he was to die!
The beautiful world lay as vivid pic
ture before him. The dark green wood
above the rocky hill where Robin Hood
and his merry men had dwelt; the frown-
ing castle with its drawbridge and square
towers; the long stretch of moor with the
purple shadowsupo it; the green, straight
walks of the village; the birds overhead,
even the daisies at his feet, he saw. But,
ahl more wildly than all he saw the
great red sun with its hazy veil lingering
above the trees as though it pitied him
with more than human pity!
He was God-fearing and God-serving
man. He had long ago made his peace
with Heaven Nothing stood between
him and death nothing rose pleading be-
tween him and those who were to destroy
him, but the sweet face of Lily De We're,
whom he loved. She had knelt at Crom-
wells feet and pleaded for his life. She
had wearied Heaven with her prayers, but
all without avail
Slowly now the great sun went down.
Slowly the last red rim was hidden behind
the green wood. Thirty seconds more
and the curfew would ring. Thirty sec
onds more and his soul would be with his
God The color did not forsake his
cheeks. The dark rings Of hair lay upon
warm brow. 1t was his purpose to die
as martyrs and brave men die. What was
lie that he should cling to it? what was
death that he should shrink from It? he
almost felt the air pulsate with the first
heaVy roll OF the death knell. But no
sound came. Still facing the soldiers
with his clear, gray eve upon them, he