The Grange advance. [volume] (Red Wing, Minn.) 1873-1877, 1876-07-05
WAITING FOR AN ANSWER,


been meventful; too simple in it's in
cidents. could tell You the sorrows
OF others, but my own-well, we'll as
you will. You shall hear. The wound
has never healed, and if put my hand
above it, the place still throbs, even as
it will beat and ache till kindly nature
says to me, ''Sleep, poor weary one,
and rest And then peacefully, trust
ingly, and with simple hope of for
giveness, may l sleep that long sleep
which they say 50 tlippantly has no
waking, but which has 4 waking, as
every lesson which we learn in life
persists in teaching us.
You will smile, perhaps, when tell
you that was once what people called
pretty-that this pale-hued face was
once plumpy and rosy, these sad eyes
bright, and this gray scant hair golden
brown, long. and flowing. But why
should think you would smile? Do
not know that you must have seen the
gay young plant putting out it's tender
leaves in spring, growing green and
luxuriant of foliage in summer, ripe
and ruddy in autumn, and gray, bent,
and withered in age? And should be
pitied because have but followed in
the way of nature! Surely not. 1t is
for that ask your sympathy, but for
the blight that fell upon the young
plant, and scared and scratched it so
that it seemed for months that it would
die; but it lived, as l have fixed to tell
you this.
DO you know that wondrous feeling
which comes in the early year, and
that strange sense of keen delight,
that elasticity of spirit, when, full of
youth and hope, the very tears of JOY
Gus sensibility start to the eyes as you
wander amidst the trees and flowers in
spring remember how l felt. oh, so
well-even though it is now forty
yeas ago, and was twenty.
Jack and were engaged. 1t was all
such Il simple, homely affair. We had
known one another for years-the
children Of neighboring farmers. Jack
i still call him by the simple old pet
name Of those days-Jack had been
away at 4 good school. and being
bright and shreWd and clever. he had
won his way on, taking to engineering
instead of his fathers farm life; and
now it had come to this that he had
been staying at home for 4 month pre-
vious to going out to d good appointment
in Melbourne.
That month IN spring. how it pass
ed ! We had met again and again, and
in his honest, manly way, he had ask
ed me to be his wife.
''You know, Grace, that I have al
ways loved you.'' he said i; ''and, now
l have hopes and prospects, it cannot
be wrong to ask you for your promise"
We were walking by the riverside
as he said this, and how we'll l can pic
ture it all-the soft gliding water
mirroring the trees on the opposite
bank, the young green buds just break
ing from their cases, and, above all,
the soft, tender blue of the spring sky
the blue, he had told me, that was
like my eyes.
':Do you want me to promise,
Jack - said, simply. as l looked up
in his face.
''No, darling am satisfied he
cried, us his strong arms held me to
his broad breast, and that was all. No
oaths could have bound me more tight
ly to him. [ felt that | was his wife
when he should come to claim me.
We were late that evening, and en-
tered the house shyly, for there had
been so much to talk Of and plan. In
a months time Jack was to sail for
Melbourne ;s.then he was to work very
hard for three years, and come and
fetch me to be his wife.
That month glided by, and the last
day had come. It was, as l told, spring
time-joyous spring-time, with the
hawthorn's snowy blossoms, the apple
trees pink, and the pear trees pearly
with their myri;lds of flowers, Every
meadow I passed was starred with
golden buttercups, and from every
spray the birds trilled or jerked forth
their merry songs of hope and love.
could not feel sad, even though l
was going to meet Jack for the last
walk before he went away; but as [
said, mingled with feelings of ecstacy
there was Il tearfulness of eye, and my
breath would come at times with sob.
He was by the stilc, waiting for me-
the stile down by the long mead, half
way between the two farms,- and as
he took my hands in his, we neither
of us spoke, but stood gazing away
over woodlaWn and meadow, all clad
in their wondrous beauty, and listened
to the birds. Now it was the; soft;
tender COO of the stock doye fromsthe
wood, now the. jerked out twittering
song of. the linnets then, soft and
mellow, from the thick hedge-rows
floated toward us the fiuty notes of the
blackbird, while far on high trilled
away the larks, singing one against
another to their mates. sitting On the.
tall grass Of the golden meads. :
We could not talk, our hearts were
+rn Full fn, lack In c1F <1>,,