Connecticut western news., 1878-02-21

which he had been silently convicted and that woman, common thief, with these stains upon her soul-was Alicia.
 Alexis heard the astonishing tidings, and know he suffered. pitied him, for loved him still-ah, yes, for .woman's heart is weak. would have died to have saved him from the shame of that woman's foul caresses. # .... -.-.s
 Inever saw him but once after the awful disclosures. It was at midnight, and I met him in @ lonely street. do not think knew what I was saying. It was my heart that spoke, while my pride was dumb.
 "Oh, Alexis !" I cried, CT don't hate you; forgive you."
 I shall never forget his look as said those words. was awed by proud, defiant something had never seen there before
 I thought then that he was angry, or that he despised me, for he turned and left me without word. I thought all this as sat there, that New Years Eve, in the solitary cabin, with the pale can- delight wavering across the ghostly shadows ill the corners. and I did not forget that death had sat there with me like spectre, or that outside the old year was bowling in his dying agonies. wished it was morning, and yet it was far from the midnight. Then grew apprehensive, and longed nervously to leave the shanty and go over to Dr. Jones's, which, thought, could not be far away.
 "I will go," I decided at length.
 Wrapping myself up warmly, I ex- tinguished the candle, and securing the door of the cabin, I went to an adjoining shanty where my horse was stabbed. The animal had been ailing for day or two. "Only cold" the woodman had said. who tended him. His food lay un- touched before him, and he stood shiver- ing with dropping head, as entered the stable, and as I put the bridle and saddle upon him he turned pitifully towards me, as if pleading dumbly against the cruel selfshness that took him out into the bitter winter night.
 "Poor old Dobbin p said I, stroking his cold neck, half resolved to relinquish my purpose.
 ! But when I looked out at the cabin, standing alone, and deserted in the ghostly shadow of the storm, felt that could not re-enter it, remembering the dear soul that had gone forth never to return, and the cold beloved clay that lay over wonder by the frozen Notpecago.
 So led him out and sprang into the saddle. On one side lay the main road that led to Pere Marquette, and on the other bridle path which I supposed, not knowing, led straight to Dr. Jones's house.
 Poor Dobbin walked reluctantly away, and under the saddle cloth I could hear his lungs heave fitfully with his laboring breath. But urged him on, for super stitious dread of what was behind drove me like goad On and on we went into the pine wilderness, along the winding track that grew narrower and darker, and strangely like the paths had sometimes seen made by straying herds through brambly places, where the foot of man had never trod.
 Strange" I said aloud, fancying that my voice would lessen the still and dreadful melancholy of the wood. "We ought to be there. Whoa, Dobbin P
 The weak, sick, stumbling creature stopped, and taking my dead parents last gift-a rare and costly watch-fron my bosom, I touched spring and held it to my ear. The tiny strokes, like the elfin ting of a grasshopper, told me that the hour was 12. Again I touched the spring and the fairy strokes counted thirty minutes.
 "Go on, Dobbin.
 The poor, faithful animal groaned, and lifted his feet wearily. The snow was up to his breast, chill and clammy, and he slipped at every step; and the sharp, iutting boughs almost thrust me from the saddle. Not a rod further on we came to the end of the path-an impass- able barrier of bushy junipers and infant pines. Nothing remained but to turn back and for another hour the sick horse toiled through the huge drifts and at the end of that hour he stopped before another inaccessible obstruction of body pines and dwarfed cypress. l knew then that was lost.
 gave my horse the rein, and, shiver- ing and .spiritless, he wandered aimlessly and futilely on. The storm had con- stantly increased, and the great snow flakes came whirling down, swarming like milk-white wasps, and their touch stung like needles of ice. There was 2 roaring and a rolling of the heavy wind ill the far wilderness, and rushing and a rocking among the tall ghostly pines that stood like phantoms hooded an6 armored in snow, and sense of insidiout and fatal cold seemed creeping through the storm. My limbs seemed frozen and my fingers were stifened round tho bridle rein.
 Poor, sick Dobbin p I said agai1 aloud, as the spent animal stopped witl moan that almost made me weep. But that groan was the groan of hi , death agony. He sank upon his knees l gasped faiAtly, shivered with @ lessenin, eoI.s ,:sis,z, rolled Foiiieti: heavily upon .sis side and died.
 . Fnrt,,pataly nv dvirs horse lid TO fall upon me. I dropped the useles r rein, and loosening my numb feet iron tho efirrY1T, 1oho,ad on th r1I1 oh tho eDoxr