The true northerner. [volume] (Paw Paw, Mich.) 1855-1920, 1876-11-24
BLACK EYES AND GRAY.
/ Thanksgiving Sketch in six Parts.
By GEORGE GARY EGGLESToN.


Mis3 Middleton was flushed and gave
other evidences of mental agitation as
she passed through the parlor to the
little closet whish was called by courtesy
her room.
The plain fact of the matter is that
Miss Middleton had quarreled with her
lover five minutes before, and that gen
tlernan had dignifedly taken his leave.
do not mean to hint that the loss OF
a lover is q matter of any moment in a
young gent!ewoman's personal history,
or that one lover more or less counts for
much; but there were two facts which
made She present case serious.
III the first place, Miss Middleton was
poor, and, now that her engagement was
peremptorily ended, her prospects in
lite were really very alarming. She had
not always been poor, and she had little
skill IN any art that promised to yield
hex aud her mother a support. They
owned a great rice plantation on the
coast, it is true, bit its dikes had been
broken, its flood gates rotted away, it's
bitches filed up during the war, and,
until refitted at great cost, it was
woree than worthless. Tax bills had
accumulated against it. and, finally, it
had been advertised for sale by the
Sheriff. The little upholstered summer
cottage in which they were now living,
consisting chiefly of piazza, together
with its two acres Of wmte sand, consti-
tuted tho whole sum of their posses
sions.
But her poverty and the barren pros
pect before her were not in Miss Mid
dleton's mind at all. There was another
and moro serious trouble in the case.
Miss Middleton loved the quiet, patient
man whom she had just sent away with
bowed head and detected countenance,
and, for some reason which she was not
psy choiogist enough to discover, send
ing him away had not in the least cured
her OF Che infatuation. The worst Of it
all wns that she had been in q passion,
and stamped her pretty little foot an
grily, and said wicked things in her final
conversation with hmi, and the memory
of all her kaughtin ss, now that he Was
gone, wos sorely disN,ieting.
Not chat she blamed herself in the
least tor the rupture or the quarrel that
dad accompanied it, by any means.
Have not sald that she was a woman
No. It was oil Mr.. Fred Breese's
fault. He ought to have known several
things that he could not pLss bly, have
found out in any way, AMI from his mas
culine stupidity in not knowing these
things the quarrel had come about, nat
Irally and NEUTRALITY-SUSPICIOUS. nature
and feminine logic being meant, OF
course.
Mr.. Breese was native of New En-
gland, aud Miss Middleton was a South
Clroiinian. Mr.. Breese had served in
the army of the Union, while Miss Mid
dieton's only brother had been buried in
a suit of gray. When Mr.. Breese first
came 10 South Carolina, therefore, and
became winter boar,ier In Mrs. Mid
dletoo's house, prudence and common
courtesy forbade the introduction of po-
Gtioal topics i'll conversation; and when,
little 10y little, Mr.. Breese became the
intim IS FREUD of the family, good feel
ing prompted both him and them to
continue the silence; so that, while there
was no discrimination on either side,
there Ind never been any discussion of
painful topics between them. When
Mr.. Bcceee returned to pass a second
winter ia the family, Mis- Middleton
had entirely ceased to think Of him rs
"Yankee " az all and when, few weeks
Later, bislsl,iion to the family changed
from. thai OF friend and boarder to tnat
of Mus Middleton g accepted s,titor, the
two had plsassnter things than political
differences TO talk about; and 80 they
forgot to remember that there was or
ever had been war between them.
On the morning of the quarrel, MIR.
Breese bad brought his New York news
paper with him from the postoflice, end
in his bScnt-muded way read it as lie
walked.
This was the origin of all the trouble,
and, if this story has any moral at all, it
is that one should never read q news
paper except sitting in n chair.
The newSI aper i'll question confined,
among other things, the Pre- sident's
proclamation appointing the last Thurs
day in November io- Thanksgiving.
Az Mr.. Breese had never seen Miss
Mddleton's early home, and as he had
reason to believe that that young gentle
woman longed to revisit the sceues of
her childhood, it hud occurred TO him TO
suggeet journey hnther; and, in order
that he might the more gracefully as
sume tie cot of carriage Lire, be pro-