The Newtown bee., 1879-04-29
|. ELY HAZARD.
 COAL,

ELY HAZARD.
 COAL.
 
 One chilly afternoon, early Tn April, the wealthy coal merchant came down to his place of business in mood that was not at all amiable. He was fond o | money, of the care and toll of traffic, and was not pleased to know that the season of ready sales and rich profits had passed by.
 Where is Almon 9 he asked the pale clerk at the desk.
 Up stairs, I believe was the an- swer.
 With an ejaculation of impatience MT. Ely Hazard began to ascend the un- slightly wooden steps. Reaching the murky landing, he pushed open scared, unpainted door, and gazed into most oddly-equipped apartment. The pale golden sunbeams glimmered | through narrow window curtained with cobwebs, dimly lighting the smutched walls and ceiling, and struggling in dull yellow gleams over a rough table in the center ofthe room. It was apeculiar picture and one singularly fascinating. The dim room, with few cheap but pretty chromos fastened on the stained and dusty wall before the rude table with it's Bohemian litter and the handsome youth bending over a | musty volume, so intensely interested that he was unconscious of the presence of an intruder
 Have you finished that business in- trusted to you P demanded the coal mer- chant, abruptly.
 The boy started, and turned his deli cate, womanish face toward his parent | with a deprecatory but graceful move ment.
 Don't be angry, father,' he returned, as if regretting pardonable dereliction Icouldn't understand the matter at all. l Ishould have blundered had attempted to settle it, so relegated the responsi- biiity to your more experienced clerk. You, could have understood if you l would declared MT. Hazard, wrath fully; but the fact is you prefer to do nothing
 l You are wrong, father, Temonstrated the boy, mildly; am not indolent. l should like to fit myself for a life of ac- l tive labor. But I shall never succeed in business that do not find congenial. You do not find my buisness con- genial, suppose retorted his father, yet more angrily. Application will teach you to like it, I think; and shall | .1l +x~ o1a me those books, young man. The boy sprang to his feet, and in stinctiyely put forth his slender young arm as if to guard his treasures. To the parent in his angry mood the action seemed wickedly defiant and undutiful, and with ungracious words he denounced his son, who listened for time forbearingly.
 Stop, father,' entreated the boy, as the denunciations became too bitter for human endurance; stop, or I shall for get that am your son.
 I do not forget I am your father, was the hot retort, as the man lifted a hasty hand and struck him blow that felled him, stunned and breathless.
 Almon staggered to his feet. He was pale as death, and blood was trickling from livid bruise on his white, girlisI forehead.
 T think had better go away, father, he said, quietly; we shall never agree and repetition of this will make Us neither better nor happier I You are right assented the other sullenly. Go. And as you choose te leave me, choose you will not return.
 And that was their parting. 1 Ely Hazard,
 eThe bustling man of enterprise,
 The fortune-founding father, rightly rough
 As who must grub and grab,'
 was not bad man, although stern ant stubborn, and much too unpublished ant practical to sympathize with the sensi I tive and spirited lad who had no liking I for the vocation that had made hi wealth.
 1 He will soon come back humblt enough, thought the father.
 But weeks, and months, and yearI passed, and Almon did not return. l he missed his son, if he grieved for him no one knew. But he aged rapidly, los all interest in traffic and gain, and finall, gave up his business for the ease and SC clusion of retired home in 9 village. His housekeeper had preceded him tt his new residence to prepare the hous for his coming, and when he arrived h the chill dawn of an Easter morning h, found his old servant dying in one Q the darkened rooms.
 I have lived out my life, sighed tn aged woman, pushing her gray hair ava. from her troubled face; and l shoul' not be sorry to go if there were any on l left to care for Zelie. It is SO sad for girl to be left all alene, without 2 frieni