Frostburg mining journal. [volume] (Frostburg, Md.) 1871-1913, 1874-01-03

night long to be remembered ; how to
be remembered by me !
1t came o'clock, and we had finished
supper My father was absent, but was
momentarily expected. [ came on
from the house, and found my ste
mother-the dearest and best of won II,
whom l loved quite as well as I could
have done my own mother standing mt
the yardgate. Through the dusk, L
could see that ragged, uncleanlylook
ing old fellow was at the gate, and l
could hear their conversation. He was
asking the privilege of staying all night
and she was evidently hesitating. L
knew why she was doing so, Within
twenty-fours our home would be full of
visitors, attracted by the wedding and
the Christmas festivities and how could
she allow that uncleanly tramp to con
taminate one of her snowy white and
immaculate beds - perhaps infect
whole chamber
heard that doubt in her voice, and |
echoed it-God forgive me [ was so
much younger then, and so much less
aware of the scares which crimes and
follies make on our natures as well as
our lives Sometimes | think our love
and our happiness make us for the mo-
mcnt harder and more selfish, Just as
at other moments they soften and refine
us. | was so happy, just then, think,
that the world was nothing to me.
Above all, | wanted no strangers, and
certainly no dirty strangers, mingling
with the family and my great Joy.
The man was pleading, even after the
refusal, to be allowed to stay; and /
Iporl him, hot snnnInI
foreign and outlandish, though he was
speaking good English enough, saying
something about Holdane.
Pshaw mother, you have debated
long enough with that old straggler y
/ said. "He knows about Holdane
and no doubt can easily find his way
there. Send him on, and come in out
of the cold, with your bare head and no
shawl
"There, my good man, you hear what
my son says" says my mother, thus
strengthened (or weakeneD by my
words. "We cannot do anything for
you tonight all full. Right up the
road there, only Il couple of miles, that
is the way to Holdane." -"
The poor fellow made one more at
tempt to create pity, and l caught his
suggestion;
Madam, let me sleep in the barn =
Instantly another unfortunate recol-
lection took possession of me. Twice,
within the preceding winter, some
neighbors' barn had been burned,
through fire alleged to have been ac-
cidentally communicated by old tramps
and beggars, who had taken up their
lodgings i'll barns, and there Gas sup
poscd) lighted their dangerous pipes
though, of course no one really knew
but that either of the fires had occurred
otherwise. However, at this suggestion,
| took the matter into my own hands,
thinking, at the moment, that my father
wonld not allow such thing.
Ono, old man," l said, "you cannot
sleep in the barn. You have heard
what my mother said; we have no
room for you. Go on, before it gets
later and colder
The old fellow turned and went his
way but l remembers catching glimpse
Of his almost white hair, by the light
from the house window, and hearing
him say, as he wrapped his poor clothes
about him:
"Cold cold y
iittNC htNSi hlloNIl, cih't, tAtCpp
that God is very slow to punish, or that
me, why | was never struck dead at the
moment for that gross act of crulty. 1
only know that j allowed him to go
away, and that dimly saw his tattered
rags disappear against the white snow
up the hill-road leading to Holdane,
which place [ must do myself the JUS
tice to say, that l had at the moment
no doubt of his reaching, the hour be-
ing SO early,
My step-mother entered the house, as
the man moved away, and [ followed her
i'll II moment. He had scarcely been
gone ten minutes when she said, look
ing at me in her own, kind, troubled
Wav -
Richard, / wonder whether we did
quite right i'll not letting the poor old
man stay? Who knows what may hap
pen to him p
"Pshaw! p / answered, "think of your
beds and remember you do not keep an
inn He will get along all well enough;
and the roads are always full of such
fellows with pitiful stories"
"Ah, well, | suppose SO but it is
very tOltt, lllCllitltl, W NC out-NtIy
cold-I wish your father was home"
She said nothing more on the subject,
and | was glad that she did not, for the
double reason that she did not wake my
sleeping conscience, as she might have
done, and that | was thus enabled to
fall away into one of my cherished wax
ing dreams, in which was bathing my
self in the light and warmth of the great
fire, all the joyful events to the next
evening-Milly i'll bridal white, with her
face ali bushes of love for me an hun
dred friends around us, all happy be-
cause we We're so and myself arrived
at that summit of happiness on which
the crown of a king, with no Mlly to
bind it on the brow, would have been an
insult. L had dreamed such dreams
thousand times before-at night in my
lonely room-by day, in my office, if
left alone and in silence for few mo-
monts-under the stars, when each
seemed sending down some benison on
my love; but never before So fondly or
vlvldly as that night when the near ap-
proach of my y7sOces gave color to some
intensity OF expectation.
My father fulfilled my mothers wish
in very brief period-perhaps half an
hourly returning, the snow crunch
ing hard under the wheels, and his
breath frozen to great icicles in his
beard. He came in to the fire, while
one OF the men led away his horse. My
mother was evidently i'll mt ease. for she