The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1877-04-14
MRS. HOUNSLOW'S EXPERIMENT.

A daughter had been the hope of Mrs
Hounslow's life. Thinking, when Law
renee was small, of the beauty of little
girl, too, with her curls running out in
rings under the lace and ribbons of her
cap, she had been obliged to change the
thought to thato the maiden who should
become Lawrence's bride, and give her
all the comfort and none of the care of
daughter.
She had always been a lonesome body;
an orphan at first, and then so few years
a wife before she was widow, with her
unruly boy at school, and she had looked
at mothers with their little girls, and en-
We'd them the companionship, the OPP
portunity of making charming dresses
for the pretty darlings, the power to live
their lives over again in their girls.
When Lawrence came home to stay
she had of course, much comfort in him;
and if the young man "enjoyed his
fling" she knew nothing about it. Yet
Lawrence's "fling" was not bad
one, as filings go; he drove fast
horse, and he loved game dinner.
When the eXuberance of youth passed
he would settle into a respectable citizen
with bank account. To her eyes, to-
day, he was paragon.
Settle. But not alone. 1t followed as
the night the day that Lawrence would
marry "a very pretty girl or very rich
one. Neither would be to Mrs. Houns-
lows taste: the pretty girl hardly the
companion she sought for herself, the
tiighty head turned by vanity, the APP
petite Unsuitable for flattery; and the rich
one mastering Lawrence, and conse-
quently herself. She had chosen herself
a charming young girl with as sweet
nature as ever shope out of blue eye;
she frequently had her there, although to
no effect except in her own dreams. In
what dreams Mrs. Hounslow INDUCED by
the evening fire apropos of Louise Man
dell! Somehow the young orphan girl
always seemed sitting on the other side
of the fire, its light dancing in her eyes,
on her dimpling smile; and sometimes
Mrs. Hounslow saw that light glance on
a little golden wedding-ring, and some
times on little golden nesting head;
and Lawrence was always standing on
the rug between the two, looking, with
equal tenderness in his dark eyes, at one
side and at the other. That was her
evening dream. In the morning Louise
moved about the house with her, cutting
flowers, filling vases, connecting choice
dishes-what mother-in-law she would
make How happy she was going to be
in this dear daughter! She had even
gone so far as to buy an open phaeton in
this dream for Louise to drive her out in
I'd ,,c+
on the color of the fringed silken canopy,
when she awoke to see that Louise was
cipher beside that great luxurious, hazel
eyed and hateful blonde, Flora Furlong
Mrs Hounslow's son and Furlong!
There was no worse blood in the land;
money enough; family enough; and yet
nothing too INSCRIPTIONS of which to
suspect the men; too selfish, silly, sloven-
ly, stupid, spiteful, of which to accuse
the womenl
Young men do not pause to think of
such things. What Flora Furlong could
work out as to his salvation did not occa-
sion Lawrence Il thought; but her lumi-
nous black-lashed eyes, with their long
white lids, and the way she had of lift
ing them, her melting mouth and velvet
skin, her hair like tine-spun gold, her
luxurious flesh--all that was fascina-
ton; and if he was not passionately in
earnest he was in a fair way to be so.
Why, she's nothing but clay, rose-leaf
clay, flesh and blood | don't believe
she has soul, or anything that answers
for onew cried Mrs Hounslow to herself.
A Furlong never did"
Flora Furlong to fill the measure of
these dreams of hers! to make her boys
homel If he was to have wife, she
was to have daughter; and the daughter
was to he her acquisition or her burden
all day long, and Lawrence's delight but
an hour or two-Lawrence's burden, too,
instead Of his blessing, by and by, if it
should be the Furlong And she had as
good right to assert her will as be had to
assert his; she knew the best; and were