Watertown republican. [volume] (Watertown, Wis.) 1860-1906, 1878-02-27
FOUND In THE SNOW-DRIFT.

Lost Lost in a snow-storm IN the
wilds of Northern Michigan, with the
painless pine wilderness stretching miles
beyond miles, on every side, without
guide or compass, my dead horse be-
side me, and the snow falling so thickly
and fast that the sky was dark with the
swarming flakes
Two months before had come from
New York to Pere Marquette, at the
summons Of my father, who had been
stricken in the midst of business by a
malady that eventually made me an
orphan girl, with small fortune, but
without relative in the world.
On stormy winter morning they
buried my father in lonely burial
place, among the pines of the Noti-
pecago river, and I was left alone. We
all know the deselation of the house of
death-the sombre windows, the funer-
al gloom, the muffled football and the
whispered voices-and many of us, in
our dumb anguish, have felt the hover
ing, unobtrusive presence of sympa-
thetic friends.
But | knew nothing of this. My
father had died in woodman's shanty
in the depth of the pinery, where he
had been stricken down in the strength
of his vigorous manhood. The I'M
couth but kind and skillful physician
remained with me to the very last, and
did all that humanity could do for me
in my bereavement.
81 don't like to leave you alone to-
night" he said to me, after the burial /;
but | have patient who is lying be-
tween life and death in our village
The storm is increasing, and it is Bit
terly cold so do not think you had
better subject yourself to the disagree
able ride tonight. l will send sledge
for you in the morning"
DR.. Jones lived mile or two away,
at some indefinite Ito me) village in the
pine forest and the railroad that ran
through the place was to be my route
of travel cityMard on the morrow. A
few dreary hours passed. Nightfall
came, and the ring of the woodlands
ak ceased Darkness came, and [ knew
by the soundless desolation around me
that the woodmen had gone home to
their distant cabins.
was not afraid | was accustomed
TO the unbroken solitude of the wilder
ness. But then there was new soil
tude to-night-the fearful solitude of
the house through which death had
stalked and left the horror of his pres
ence upon every object around. I
missed, too, the patient figure on the
bed in the dim corner, for whose les
SEEMING breath [ had been wont to listen
in the watches of the friendless mid
night. | lit candle and put it high
upon dresser, that its wavering light
might reach the farthest nook of this
doleful room. Then [ sat down before
the stove and tried to think Life
doomed up before me like a barren
mountain on which the sunlight fell not,
and the birds sang not, nor the flowers
blossOmed.
The new year would come to-mor-
row. One year ago [ had been so
blessed, SO happy now how hopeless,
how miserable [ was. One year ago
Alexis loved me, and I loved him, and
we were betrothed Then my father
had gone on his fatal Western quest !;
and little after she came-that tiger
ish animal in her sumptuOus beauty,
who lived deliciously, and whose smile
made men mad
Alicia Lowering came with her bland
ishments and won the NANNY lover
for whom she cared less than she did
for the jewel she wore on her breast
And Alexis forgot me and Alexis rode
with Alicia in her phaeton in the morn
ings he rode beside her in the after
noon, with one hand on her bride rein
and his adoring eyes upon her face ;
he dined with her in her luxurious
apartment, he supped with her when
weary they sang, and laughed, and
loved and 1 was forgotten.
For Alexis was drunken with her en-
chantments. He loved her, and he
would have married her. And then
the sequel came A shabby. loathsome
outlaw deposed. with the most con-
demnatory proof, that this runaway
wife was the perpetrator of an atrocious
crime for which he had been silently
convicted and that woman, a 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 wo-
mans heart is weak. | would have died
to have saved him from the shame OF
that womans foul caresses.
| never saw him but once after the
awful disclosures. 1t was at midnight,
and [ met him in a lonely street. | do
not think | knew what | was saying. It
was my heart that spoke, while my pride
was dumb.
"On, Alexis p' / cried, Il don't hate
you forgive you"
shall never forget his look as | said
those words. | was awed by a proud,
defiant something | had never seen
there before.
| thought then that he was angry, or
that he despised me, for he turned and
left me without Il word. [ thought all
this AS | at there, that New Years Eve.
i'll the solitary cabin, with the pale can
die light wavering across the ghostlA
shadows in the corners, and did not
forget that death had sat there with me
like specter, or that outside the old
wear was bowling in his diving agOnles