Litchfield enquirer., 1876-06-22

looked for, she gave little guilty start, but he went on !:
 ''You really should devote yourself to music. Would you like it?
 .'Oh, can I?-can IF" she cried, carried out of herself. ''Are you really in earnest?"
 Indeed am; a voice like yours is 8 gift too rare to be thrown away. I had forgotten you possessed such talent"
 But her face had fallen; the first bright possibility receding once more into the impossible.
 ''Of course can't, though. Uncle Zab- diel-''
 ''Surely, Clemence," interrupted Ash ford, decisively, ''you must permit me 8 voice in the.matter Out of my useless abundance you cannot object to some slight return for all the pleasure I can never repay. Besides, it would be an un- heard-of crime to bury that voice here. !" And as she hesitated, he continued, "Let us leave it to your aunt. She is model of propriety.". To which Clemence, in bewilderment, consented.
 'In fifteen minutes you shall know your fate." And, energetic for once, Ashford departed, to return in less than the allotted time, triumphant.
 ''Very properly. Mrs. Burton recognized the justice of my arguments. So it IS set tied that in four weeks you begin those studies. Miss Clemence, that shall end in crowning you prima donna"
 The first excitement over, 1t came home to her with tremendous force. She, Clem- ence Burton, might some time sing 1n concerts, her face the star of gazers, her voice the spell of hearers, and the stage all bloom and light, as she remembered it. And-and-the sweetest petal lies closest to the heart. A hope arose too dear to contemplate.
 Before Ashford's return to Europe where he had mostly spent the last few years-Clemence was placed under the tuition of an Italian master in New YOrks A musician of no small renown, the wealth fest pupil without marked ability, might hope for his instruction with as slight 8 chance of success as for one of the French Academy's forty arm-chairs. Yet on hear ing the girls voice he showed even an anxiety to teach her. And Clemence's musical career was decided on.
 'I shall come home in two years, Clem- ence," said Ashford. at hls departure Meanwhile it is whim of mine to know nothing of your progress. Only I have set my heart on your success, and if dis appointed" he added, laughing, 'I warn you that my interest in you ceases from that moment. To recall that terrible threat, wear this, and look at it every day." But there was no word of love, nor allusion to a deeper significance, as he placed the ring upon her finger.
 Daily Clemence looked at it, and daily she advanced it the good graces of her teacher, who appreciated her unwearied study, her brave struggle with difficulties, and felt keen, artistic pleasure in the development of her voice
 ''We shall see," he would exclaim, rub ping his hands. ''Two, three years, and then! We will bring you out! We will show the world a very Queen of Song, Meess Clemence!"
 Which was fattering prospect for "Meess Clemence."
 One rainy day the future. prima donna waited some ten minutns for stage. On entering one at last her feet were wet and chilled; on leaving it, they were two Jumps of ice.
 Next morning she could not practice for the dull ache in her throat, that by afternoon became so serious the physl clan gave peremptory orders against sing ing for week at least.
 The week expanded to fortnight, by which time she was perfectly recovered, and sat down with impatience to her long, unused piano Running hastily through the prelude of her last song. she played the first bar of the air, and burst into tears, .for she could nOt sing c note! Her weary time of waiting was not ended yet. No voice remained even to caricature it's former self. Except in speaking, she was literally. dumb.
 On hearing her new trouble, the physi- elan looked grave.
 ''And how long will it last?" continued Clemence.
 "My dear young lady," he said, hesita- tlngly. ''your case is peculiar one. l fear"
 Her large eyes opened inquringly. "Shal wait a long while. do you mean?"
 "A long. long while; in fact, my dear, am sadly afraid you will 1aeUer sing again. And the kind doctor looked over his spectacles very sorry, but without the faintest sense of what this meant to her.
 Clemence whitened, but asked, bravely, ''Is it certain?"
 ''Very nearly. A few such cases have come within my knowledge, and the voice has never been regained. am sorry to pain you, Miss Burton, but it is best that you should know the truth"
 And half an hour later, by bedside where life and death hung balanced, he had forgotten his last patients slight af- fiction.
 And Clemence?
 Never again! The very walls seemed to repeat those words in the room where nothing had changed but herself, whence nothing had gone but hope. The useless piano, the Italian song upon the rack, mocked at her. And clearer still another sentence sounded, "My interest in you ceases from that moment" till her brain grew dull and heavy.
 She saw no use in living now. She wish ed the sun would not shine so when she felt sick and tired. Every thing jared on her. A canary at the window maddened her with his jubilant note. What was he rejoicing for? Why should any thing be glad? For the first time that sense of genenal pitilessness attendant upon grief was stinging Clemence Attuned to it, we do not recognize the cruelty of happi- ness; outside it, misery itself is kinder.
 This weight of woe seems overstrained. Think of it moment. Expression, the of self in something beyond, is necessity of some natures; and to Clem- ence, who had thrown into it her intense oneness of being. this pursuit had signi- fled art, work, and love. For that secret hope, the inspiration of her genius, had entered into every thought and feeling.
 Now the cup at her lips was dashed down, as is usually the case when one yearns too feverishly for its contents; and what remained for her?
 To go back to the old life of drudgery she thought to have;left behind forever this was lAll. To wear out the years in the red farmhouse, tortured by that eter- nal moaning of the pines, which even now rang in her ears. She put her hands to them in a vain endeavor to shut 1t out. And the river-it seemed to rise from Its banks, to follow, to overtake her. while spell held her fast; and the foam dashed it's spray nearer. nearer, till with one great burst and a roar as of thunder it broke over her, and she sank-sank-into un- 
 Summer again at Hillburn. All the old fashioned flowers show 1t in their yeined