The New Bloomfield, Pa. times. (New Bloomfield, Pa.) 1877-188?, 1879-09-16
A WOMAN'S MISTAKE.


well to begin my story by stating the
fact that arrived at that certain age,
with bumps that would have delighted
o Lavater, since the various little idio-
syncracies which will develop my
character in the course of this narrative
will be n surprising illustration of phre-
nological contretemps.
/ had taken the train at the very Dutch
and respectable city of Schenectady
for purposes which will duly tram
spire, and was delighted to find the
car full of people as 1 entered-for next
to the poets, at this certain age the study
of character as seen in n railroad car
riage was my most profound delight.
On this particular day, however, the
most interesting of my companions
du Uoydge were absorbed in the highly
matter.of-fact discussion of peanuts
with their teeth--and, with mind half
made up to feel injured being deprived
of my chiefest enjoyment in travelling,
l had taken a sensational friend in red
cloth bindings from my satchel, and
was about turning in disgust from the
real of humanity to an ideal world peo-
pied with charming pen-and-ink folk,
when the voice of man, most musical,
arrested my attention, and Immediately
my whole thought was precipitated in
one grand concentration upon the speak
er, who sat directly in front of me, and
of whom l could see nothing but pair
of magnificent shoulders, strong,
broad neck, a mass of bewitching black
hair, and a section of Panama hat.
/ do not for moment suppose that
this demonstration on my part was
attended with any particular noise,
momentous as it would at first appear;
nevertheless, without other, or the least
visible cause, the stranger turned him
self fairly around upon his seat. For u
moment our eyes met, holding one to
the other in unaccountable questioning,
then somehow, my book went tumbling
down Off my lap. l stopped to raise the
elegant and wicked gentlemen and ladies
between its covers from the contaminat-
ing and startled dust of the car floor,
and again resuming q perpendicular. L
saw the back of the stranger as uncon-
cernedly opposed to the plush cushions
and my gaze as if there were no books
TO fall, no embarrassed young woman
to disorder her best bonnet in perform
ing the face-reddening office of picking
them up; as if there were no persons
to be considered in all that carload of
selfimportance save his most magnifi-
cent self.
/ do not think 1 could have grown
redder than l had already become, in
my spasmodic effort to convert myself
into the similitude of a hairpin in the
interest of literature; but L certainly
waxed indignant at this exhibition of
royal indifference, utterly unwarranted
by the circumstances. Still, had a
stranger been closely observing my
countenance, that stranger would have
pronounced upon the blanching of my
peony cheeks, upon the blush line creep
around my mouth, and frightened
expression that came into my eyes,
because of the inexplicable suddenness
Of the change.
81 should prefer to sacrifice a dozen
such fortunes as the one you claim ]
have thrown away rather than to bind
myself to bride not of my own choos
ing, and to welded life from which
the very circumstances attending il
would preclude all hope of love!" hat
heard the stranger say this, with grea
force of manner; and, for a most excel
lent reason, could have sobbed aloud
but that was altogether too large fo
such an undignified proceeding in pub
lie, to say nothing of the absurd ten
dency toward pink which my unfor
tunate nose always manifested on sucl
occasions.
In attempting to map out the desti
ny of another, one is usually preparing
oneself for ultimate defeat" answere,
the companion of this emphatic stranger
and then there came roaring in M,
ears that out-clamored the rumbling G
the train.
The locomotive, 1 was persuaded
must have taken to some made prank
of steam and power, for L felt the ca
rise up under me like the bowed back {
cat, and then and my consciousness
shot out into ineffable space; and mt
ment later, with an odd sense of havin
done something mortifying and
l became assured that the train was pu