Watertown republican. [volume] (Watertown, Wis.) 1860-1906, 1878-04-24
A LEGEND OF ST. LOUIS.
THE ERA OF L'ANNEE DU COUP.

1880, and consequently near the close
of the revolutionary war. France and
Spain had both been drawn into the
whirlpool of that tremendous strife !;
but the fact had hitherto scarcely af
fectcd their subjects in the remote re-
giops of the Missouri, thousands of
miles away from the fierce battle scenes,
whether on the land Or sea. Occasion
ally dispatches from the government. it
is true, had been received by the mill
tary commandment at St. Louis, which
doubtless contained advice as to the
progress of the pending struggle; but
as there was no official journal-indeed
no journal of any sort-and as his eX-
cellencv was man Of Infinite reserve,
the information never TRANSFERRED be-
yond the precincts of the old stone pal
ace; and the citizens continued to live
on in blissful ignorance, unalarmed by
various vague rumors, which only told
how the cannon roared and how blood
was split affair off, They often congrat-
ulated one another as 20 the situation
OF their country, SO far removed from
the rest of the world that the shock Of
arms which was rending nations asun-
der hardly sent feeble echo into their
boundless forests, did not SO much as
cause leaf to tremble on their ancient
trees. Thus the keeper of the light
house trims his lamps with sense of
greater safety as louder breaks the howl
of the storm at sea! No one anticipated
the possibility of danger. No one could
dream that Great Britain, hard pressed
at almost every point Of her immense
don-inions by the most formidable Goa
lition which ever had been combined to
resist her gigantic power, would waste
one thought on an insignificant settle
ment in the silent woods of the west
No preparation, therefore, had been
made to oppose hostile invasion.
There were very few soldiers at the post,
and the discipline of these had been
latterly entirely neglected. The rude
fort was out of repair, and the useless
artillery eaten up with rust.
It was the first hour of evening, on
the day before specified, when man
and woman, both young, elegantly
dressed according to the French fash
ion of the period, and obviously belong
ing to the wealthiest class of the emf
grants, were seen to leave the town of
St. Louis and stroll arm and arm in a
northern direction. They were engaged
in conversation with the volubility char
acteristic of their nation; and their he
reditary gate de occur seemed to be in
creased by some peculiar emotion that
sufused their faces with the richest
crimson, and caused their eyes to spar
kle with light like brilllants. In short
las we abhor mystery, the worst of lit
erary sins), they were lovers, and the
morrow had been fixed for the celebra
ton of their nuptials. The universal
opinion of all the gossips in the city
concurred, as by miracle, for once,
q That no two beautiful beings in the
other than Pierre Choteau and Annette
LIE Roux-since he was the bravest and
she the most bewitching of all Gods
creatures on this side of Paris
The two, however, not caring a whit
for anybody's thoughts on earth save
their own, wandered on, discOurslng
music and culling flowers that grew all
along the borders of their path, until
they reached those extraordinary
mounds which, at the distance of a few
hundred yards above the town, shoot
suddenly up from the plain in the shape
of colossal and nearly perpendicular
stacks. They assembled one Of these,
called the falling garden" of which all
travellers speak with enthusiasm as a
most remarkable curiosity. When the
lovers gained its summit they found an
individual there before them. He was
a tall, dark-skinned man, with long
black hair and bushy mustache slightly
tinged with gray. The stranger grew
pale and then frowned at the approach
of Pierre and Annette, and almost ip-
stantly turning on his heel, left the e1e-
vation and hastily walked towards the
river.
As soon as he was out of sight An
nette said, with an involuntary shudder
=" Francois Mallet! What can have
brought the murderer back from the
SHOWS of CANADA
Francois Mallet p' repeated Pierre
in astonishmenu. "Can that be the vii
lain who prosecuted you with his obi
Gus attentions during my absence to
Paris, and who shot your brother in shat
ill-arranged duel?'
1t is the same unmltlgated wretch.
"Why hd you not tell me before he
escaped?'
II feared for you. I saw the handle
of pistol in his bosom"
After a few more words, unimportant
as respects our story, the lovers de-
scended from the picturesque height of
the falling garden" and returned to
the city, ssdder from the incident
which they had met with on the mound
than when they set forth on their eve
ming ramble. AS they re-entered the
narrow streets, lined mostly with frail
whitewashed houses, the first sun of
September went down in a serene sky;
and a cannon doomed from the wooden
fortress; and the new church bell sang
silyer-chined song; and the old Mis-
sisssppi roared, as it will roar when its
throat is filled with II great flood, till
the crack of DOOM" And there was
cheerful sound of labor in the work
ShODS and the low sweet hmm of chill