Omaha daily bee., 1874-08-21
SADNESS AND MELANCHOLY?

Those who have passed through a
like experience will understand 1t.
Mark kissed the baby.
"Well-good-bye," he said.
"Good-hye," she answered.
But neither held out a hand
across the gulf which lay between.
Isabel had said that the old
dreams and ambitions shone before
her again. She was but twenty
when her ill-starred marriage ended
in a miserable divorce |; only just
beginning life then, so to speak.
The dream of her girlhood, before
she met Mark Hascall, and found
in him her "congenial SOUL" had
been to go on the stage and be
famous. All! Idon't suppose there
ever was a romantic girl or boy
who didn't have the same dream
one time or another. The ambition
came back to her now with a wild
heart-bound. If she could become
an actress, and show them all what
she was capable of-Mark,w who had
blighted her life, as she said to her.
self, the coarse old mother-in-law
who snubbed her, and even her
own father and mother, who seemed
tined of her and disappointed in her,
and to look upon her as a burden on
their bands, and who somehow
didn't seem to care for her as they
used,
She didn't consult all her friends
about 1t. She made up her mind
all to herself, and when she was
ready to 60 she just went, and the
friends stormed afterwards. When
you want to do a thing, The best
way is to go and do 1t. Isabel was
young, bright, handsome, and per-
severing, therefore she succeeded,
and when she was successful her
friends who had turned their backs
on her turned around face front
again, and opened their arms. It's
the way of the world.
Her life was full of ups and
downs, and petty vexations, too,
and hard work; but throughout it
sill she had one steady joy
HER BRAVE, BRIGHT, PRETTY BOY,
her Leon. Mothers heart could
not have longed for q finer son. He
grew and thrived like a June bios
som, until one morning Isabel re-
membered that it was his birth
day, and he was ten years old. He
had nevsr given her a moments
sorrow in his life, except that, when
he was a very little fellow, he used
to run to her from his play some
times, and say:
"Tommy's papa is going to take
him a ride. Where is my papa,
mother ?"
At such moments life seemed very
bitter for a little while. AS the
child grew older, though, he ceased
to ask her such questions. He
seemed to understand it himself.
And now Leon was ten years old,
and she had heard no word of Mark
Hascall since the day he kissed the
child and went away.
That summer she took the boy
and went to an obscure farm. house
in Maine for the vacation. Though
in Maine the settlement was as
new and unfinished" one might
say, as any place in the Western
gilds. That was why she chose it.
She saw so much art all the year
round that the very breath of nature
rested and gladdened her life. They
had neither doctor mol minister in
the settlement. They didn't need
any doctor, they said, and no min
lister liked so rough a living as theirs
was.
The old lady at the farmhouse
gave Isabel her lest bed, covered
with the delight of her eyes, her
'saw-tooth" quilt, with calico teeth
so sharp and fierce that they looked
as if they might have sawed your
head off at any moment. Isabel
liked It, because it was old-fashioned
and countryish, and somehow, as
she grew older, oountryish thirgs