The Jasper weekly courier. [volume] (Jasper, Ind.) 1858-1922, 1880-03-26

awhile, pale but beautiful, she resumed
her place in the household and took up
one by one her old tasks. Like lily,
like . wild rose, like . bit Of mignonette,
she Frightened and sweetened the place
where she dwelt. Hers the mission
which no woman need despise, TO make
people happy, 70 charm away their sui
len moods, and to diffuse pleasantness
wherever she appeared.
Only with her father she had lost her
old magic. His smiles grew infrequent
and his temper more capricious and un-
certain than ever.
II don't know what to think Of Dea-
con Cameron" said the pastor, Mr..
Denbigh, who for thirty years had la
bored In the Hillside Church. He was
talking contidentially with his wife.
"He Is becoming more cranky and
crotchetty every day. did hope that
the illness Of his child would have
wrought change; but, II 30. il Is a
change for the worse. am informed
that he forbids young Murray to enter
his door; and when asked him TO in
crease his subscription to our Domestic
Board, he treated me as though were
begging for myself. Adversely hardens
a man when il does not refine him."
1t may be, said the pastors gentle
wife, "that God Is striving with the
Deacon. There is good in him, am
sure. | think he is not at peace with
God, or with himself, just now. He
knows no Is in the wrong about Agnes,
and he is, therefore, not comfortable.
Perhaps, dear, we have'not prayed for
him as we ought"
The plain fact was that the Deacon
was exceedingly uncomfortable in his
mind. He had offered a genuine pray
or and pledged an honest VOW, fully
meaning to keep his word, while
in his heart had been vague
idea of propitiaton, as he knelt be:
meath the oak. When Agnes had first
begun to grow stronger, his resolution
had been firm 10 fulfill his word; but as
she had crept onward to health, it had
loosened its hold upon him.. Could a
miracle have been performed, and the
maiden have arisen from her couch, at
one triumphant bound, from death to
life, he would have been awed and over
whelmed aud in haste TO make good his
word to the Almighty. The compare
tive slowness of her restoration had
given time to his nature to assert itself,
and he was really more ill-tempered.
cross grained and churlish than he had
been before. Even to Agnes he was
sometimes harsh; the more so that,
under her soft exterior and winsome
ways, the slender girl had an underly-
ing subsoil of granite, not unlike his
own character and far tougher and
firmer than the fabric Of which her gen
tie mother was made.
Agnes loved her father, but she loved
her friend too. If Edgar were prohlb-
tied from visiting her at her own hearth,
she was not ashamedto meet him openly
under the sky; to walk with him to the
choir rchcarsals; and to 60 riding with
his sister, while he held the rcins and
his swift horses, the admiration Of the
county, trotted smoothly up hill and
down vale and over the hard, beautiful,
tloor-like roads which swept around
mountain sides, skirted limpid streams,
and intersected the thriving villages
which dotted that portion Of the State.
Had any other member Of his family
thus. dared his displeasure, the Deacon
would have met them with prohibition
and threatening; but il was too late to
begin this course with Agnes, whom he
did not wish to drive into entire es-
arrangement So the year wore on,
darkiing and sorrowful in the Cameron
household, though outwardly all things
prospered and whatever the Deacon
touched turned TO gold.
His main trouble was with his Bible.
Turn where he would, the verses famil-
lar from his childhood Knocked him.
The word vow seemed to stare at him
from every page 1t was David who
said: "Shall offer to the Lord sacri-
fees Of that which cost me nothingp"
And David had always been his favorite
character. But they all paid their
vows.
Even Jephthah, whose rash and
sweeping pledge to the Deity had in
volved the offering Of his only daughter
in dark and mysterious doom, had not
shrunk from the terrible exaction.
Saul, in moment Of haste, had
condemned a possible off, nder to
death; and 10! it proved to be Jonathan
who must meet the bolt Of fate, and only
the majestic protest OF the united nation
had awaited to save him. The Bible was
an armory which bristled with weapons
turned constantly against the Deacon's
conscience. And while he sat at the
head Of his table, silent, constrained,
and gloomy, imposing an unwholesome
and irritating repression on wife and
children, fiery battle was raging with
In him. He grew to dread Agncs's
sweet, composed face, where the patience
which could wait indefinitely, and hold
its own to the last, was already stamp.
ing q Madonna-like dignity. Often,
a. he saw Edgar Murray in church, he
felt that he was unreasonable In oppo-