The Bolivar bulletin. [volume] (Bolivar, Hardeman County, Tenn.) 1865-1888, 1879-08-21


little girl, eagerly. ss That was my
dooty agin, there bein' no minister
replied the old station-agent, humbly.
'' Wal, put that letter long with the
other one, and I made il my duty, too,
to plant those Weepin' willers close by
the graves so they might have shade
tree of their own a CROWN over 'em
after all.''
Snow m'a'm,'' said Uncle Sammy,
drawing a long breath, 's all this I've
told ye is stranger, stranger
than any thing I've ever found sot down
in books, but it amt nowhere nigh so
strange as what came next, this is what
makes the whole look as if it was made
up story. The poor unfortinits slept for
matter of five years, or so, in their
lonely graves, peacefully, only Free
mans wife used to say she saw 'em in
hot, dry weather, a waterin' the roots
of the willow sot out, with their tears,
and that would set all the children in
Shanty village carryin' water to it from
the brook, and the tree grew and -four
ished till now Ye see it's beauty.
"Wal, one summer time there come
up through here a great company of
Mormons from England on their way
to Utah. The agents shipped 'em
about as if they were cattle, and took
'em on extra trains SOS to connect with
the Grand Trunk. The engines was to
be changed here at this station, and a
lot of folks had gathered to look at the
Mormons, as If they was wild animals
instead of pack of poor, deluded hu-
man bein's.
"Just as the train whistled, Free.
mans wife sidled up to me, and says
she, somethin's up with them unfor-
limits. They was out on the track all
last night, every time there was a whis-
tie, with their hands up over their eyes
a lOOkin' down the road into the dark
ness. There they be now!' said she,
under the shade of the big hemlock,
over on the edge of the glen there
watchin' for the train But looked and
couldn't see nothin' 'cept them two
white birch sapliEas. just then the ex-
ira came putin aud blowin' along, and
as soon as il stopped the poor Mormons
begun to swarm out like so many sheep,
with no more of an idea than sheep of
the great ways they had yet to go afore
they got to the promised land.
'fAmong the rest that got out was a
poor, old, tremlin', White-haired man
that tottered about a little and said to
me as was passin' him, do you know,
good sir, of a town called Brackenboro,
in Ameriky?' Brackenboro is ten miles
north of here, said I, it's the next
station you'll stop to- At that he threw
up his white, withered hands, opened
his mouth as if to speak, and dropped
dead at my feet.
"'Old Hugh Leigh is dead,' said a
sharp-vOiced woman at my elbow; 'he's
dead, and I'm glad enoW. He's been
nOught but a trouble ever since we start
ed. But he would come when he found
it was to Ameriky we was bound, if it
took his last farthing. Now l hope he's
satisfied
"'He thought he should be fndin'
John and Alice and the baby said an
other woman, 'but they have been still
now. They never writ one blessed word
they didn't want the trouble of him.
But the old man was always sayin' Alice
needed him to help take care of baby
Mary. He's dead and Pm glad on it.
His old heart was well nigh broke with
waitin' for a letter. said the shrill-
voiced woman, snatchin' the hat off the
dead mans head and disappearing in
the car just as the whistle sounded, and
they were off once more. We laid the
old man out in the freight-hOuse in his
turn
SAN It was there the tree ghosts kept
watch by the body, and treeman's wife
she seed 'em,n put in the square, little
girl, enthusiastically
"And the verdick was give this time, -
went on the old station-agent, "' I'm
known Mormun dropped dead from heat
at South Verony.' We buried him be-
side the others, and there's never been
a shadder of a doubt in my mind but
what he was the grandfather"
An I heard Uncle Sammy pray this
time,'' said Brislin's IS girl, quickly, '' an
L niver shall forgit how he towld about
it that they was all togither now, and
that God was always good"
"Of course did my dooty, there be-
| in no minister reiterated Uncle Sam
my; and 1 also made it my dooty to
plant that willer fence all round their
| graves. And Freeman's wife sees 'em
all there as happy as can be under the
big willer. They have never walked
about since the grandfather come.
! Sometimes 1 think they was unfortinits,
and then agin I think they was forti-
nits. Any way, it's clear to my mind
that the good Lord had special charge
over 'em.''
And we three then wiped our eyes
in company-Uncle Sammy and l and
the square little girl.-MTS. A7a7ste Il.
Preston, ilg SDTS1QJIeLd Rep9bltcG7l.