The Ottawa free trader. [volume] (Ottawa, Ill.) 1843-1916, 1875-11-20

, FaSeu them with asekniNcS besides me OHl
| tons. Is the cellar.door lightg Is everything
J Tight Bette, take care OF the babies min
ne iur mother. John, come hereW
She led him 10 The little attic, and from th'
mar -ow, lhiec-Cornercd window pointed 10 th'
prairie, sill without u word
And sthl, how beautiful it was! How The
= wind played like one gone crazy for JOY VIII
I. the tender tops Of the unbroken, unboundet
r grass And soft, as if the world had gone t.
| sleep for safety, fell the magnificent sun
Beautiful, terrible, treacherous thing!
Cutting through the soft horizon line SHARP
rs The knife throug shrinking flesh, SIX DARK
figures doomed against the sky. Wildly be
fore lnen, with the gigantic STRIDES OF long
! stepped roadster, fled big, gaunt, homley
grand old horse. And clinging with little
bright, bare feet 10 his white sides, and cling
ing with little despairing arms to one anoth
! er--'
"My God! They are our boys'
John Jacobs threw up his arms and ran.
i Quick as woman's thought ran his wife
was before him and had bolted the attic door
/ Where are you going, johns
She spoke he thought, in her natural tones
though she trembicd horribly. Where was he
going; Why, TO meet them, save thcm-get
| his gun-bloN these devil, brains out-"haI
dld she mean? y by did she keep him
Quick, quick Open the door!
my husband" SAID Susan, still in those
strangely quet tones eve cannot save our
! boys. Look for yourself and see, They will
be shot before they reach the house. We have
three children left. You must save them, and
| for their sakes yourself, John. Keep the
door locked. Keep the windows barred Keep
! the shutters drawn. Give me the old pistol
and my gun Take your own and guard the
.l,,r ph "a N hat q II "A
| here and be let in. But not one step outside
| that door, John Jacobs as you're the father of
three living children! o John, John, John !
My poor little boys!'
| He thought she would have broken down
at that. He thought he could never get her
from the attic floor, where she lay trembling
in that horrid way, with her chin on the win
dow.sill and her eyes set upon the six dark
figures, and ;he grand, old ugly horse upon
which the slipping, Keeling, hopeless, pre-.
clous burden chung But all he could hear
her say was "Mother's poor little boys"
Mothers poor little boys indeed and indeed ,
Leap your mighty leaps, Jerusalem; they're
none too large your great legs that Tam and
Titus have 50 often made fun of are none too
long tor their business now. How the splen
did muscles throbbed beneath the terrified
bare feet ! No wondering which WAS horse and
now. There was no WILL no muscles, no
nerve, no soul, but the brave soul of old Jeru
salem win you get US home? Can he ever
ever keep ahead SO long? Oh how the ar
rows fly by! We shall be hit, we shall be HIT
O mother, mother, motherl
"Tam, why don't father come to meet us :?
Why don they do something for US, Tam?
Has mother forgotten u.s.
That, think, must have been the cruelest
minute in all the cruel story.
And yet, perhaps not so cruel as the min
ute when the mother at the attic window,
gave one long, low, echoing cry and came,
staggering from the post, downstairs to say
still in that strange voice that mothers such
AS she will have at such minute: John,
they are hit; the arrow struck them both.
Let me to the kichen.window You stay at
the door. There's just a moment now
There was but moment, and like "a wild
dream the whole dreadful sight came sweep
ing up over the garden INTO the yard.
Now John could not see anything but the
mighty form Of the horse Jerusalem. To this
day he says that the saddle, to his eyes as the
magnificent creature leaped by, was empty as
air. He only saw the horse-and the horse
made straight for the barn.
But why did the savages pursue a riderless
horse9 And whooping and shouting cruelty
after it, into the barn they plunged.
"The boys are on the horse in hoarse
whisper SAID the mother; II saw them both.
They are bleeding and falling The arrow
has pinned them together John, but they We
kept their seat"
"My boys are pretty good riders" said
John, turning the whole face round with a
grim, fathers pride, even them "but even
nay boys can't keep horse after they're shot
thrpuun the hntv FRIGHT has tnrppl Won r
brain, Susan
| tell the story just as 1t was told to me :;
and the way of that was this: flow Jerusa-
lem leaped into the barn with the boys, or so
the mother thought, bleeding upon his back :;
how the savages secured the barn. the yard,
the garden, plundcred little here and there
and titiully attacked at intervals the barri-
caded house; how John, brave and white at
one door, and Susan, white and brave at the
other, abundance Of powder and unflinChng
hearts, and the love of three helpless babes
drove them, by aud by, sulenly away how,
when they had been long safe hour gone,
the parents, shivering and sad, crept out with
white lips, little by little, as they dared to
hunt for the bodies OF their poor murdered
boys.
They amt in the barn." said the father,
bringing his hand heavily across his eyes
IN go to the woods. suppose they scalped
the little fellows, and left them there"
But the mother, when he was gone, went
around and around, stealthily as cat, about
the barn. All, blessings forever on the
mothers ear, and blessings on the mothers
eye.
From pile of fresh earth thrown up in
the barnyard a little stream of blood came
,rickling down-aud she saw it. Deep and
from the middle of the mound n little cry
came, faint, terrOr-sricken, smothered-5ut
she heard It..
To be sure. When Jerusalem-bess him |!
went leaplhg through the barn door, just
an arrows length ahead of his pursuers, of
tumbled Tam and Titus, and out into the
barnyard, and down into the pile of mud and
gravel, deep and safe And about and about,
and here and there, the Indians had searched
and secured and grumbled-and gone; and
there they were,
Pinned together with the arrow? Truly,
YES. Just under the shoulder and Titus had
the worst hurt, as will sometimes happen with
the good boys and how they ever did it and