The Donaldsonville chief. [volume] (Donaldsonville, La.) 1871-current, 1880-08-28
Our BrOadbriln Letters.

Two Enoch Ardsns- Sudden Re-appear-
ancss after Absences Of Forty and Ton
Years-Temperanoe Rsyival-A Lage1
Beer War, eto.
New YoRK, Aug. u, 1880.
EDlToR CHIEF:
II Enocl, Arden could have dropped
down in Brooklyn gu Monday last he
would have been diegnsted will, him
self, aud have committed suicide; for
a man turned up here after an absence
Of forty years, not q poor, wo1n-out
i skeleton, a sort Of attenuated Tanner,
bnt q good, wholesome paunchy citi-
zen, with u corporation On him like a
London alderman, and q plethoric
sack witl,al, wherein was sufficient
dncats to keep the pot boiling for
many years to come. In the year
1910, q young gentleman named Phil
lips fell iD love with pretty girl by
the name Of Jane Howard, whose
father was we'll endowed with gilders
and houses aud lands. It is not to be
supposed that these merceuary ad j.
vantages made Jane took less lovely
in the eyes Of young Phillips. A son
aud heir crowned their welded love ;
yet, strange to say, the young hus-
band did not receive the news with
that unqualified satisfaction that one
might naturally expect, for that very
night, August 2, 184l, Mr.. Phillips
was seen to step out nf his back door
and for all practical and legal pur-
poses, except indeed for life assurance
that was the last Of Mr.. Phillips.
The morgue was visited every day
for months, and the river was dragged
from Atlantic Dock to Harlem in the
hope Of finding his REMAINDERs, but
w AouOsuucS0 Wtio tO w AOuDu.
Somebody suggested that the eels
might have got him aud devoaled
him all but his boots. Then fisher
man remembered that the sea SER
pent, whicl, for many years had been
cruising off Sandy Hook, had been
seen the day before PHILIPPE disap-
pearance, and the presumption was
that if he had jumped overheard from
IL ferry boat, that the sea serpent had
undoubtedly go! him. At all events,
he was gone. The police were noti-
fed; notices were put in the papers,
u reward Of twenty five tlo}Ials stim-
ulating the sluggisl' powers of the
detective force, to restore him to his
weeping wife and disconsolate family,
either dead or alive. Enoch Arden
was not yet born from the poets
brain, but Mrs. Phillips had undouot-
edly beard Of the return Of scallawag
husbands after many years Of absence,
SO not wishing to be caught in any
biganous trap, she wore her widows
weeds for ten long years, and ut last
accepted the heart and hand Of Mr..
Henry Wiggins. Twenty-Five happy
years she was Mr.. Wiggins' wife, and
five years ago she passed to "tlat
bourne from whence no traveller re-
tu,ns." Mr.. Wiggins took charge of
his wife's estate, and every thing ran
smoothly for nearly five years, when
who should suddenly reappear but the
identical Phillips, who had been dead
and buried for nearly forty years.
The ghost had evidently been well
fed, and the mermaids down below
had filled his pouch, for it is said that
Immediately on his return he lepos-
tied fifty thousand dollars in the bank,
:le result Of his forty years. cruise.
He is at present living with his son,
who is physician in excellent prac-
tice, aud as far as known, he has not
yet disclosed the cause of his sudden
departure, nor the place of his sojourn
for nearly half century.
1t never rains but it ponrs, and
almost on the same day of the arrival
of Mr.. Phillips, Mr.. Theophilus Youngs
turns up, whom we mourned as dead
for mole than decade. Mr.. Yonngs
has been absent for over ten years,
and from present appearances, no
extra Grape wonld have been put on
their hats if he had not come back at
all. A large estate had been left to
two brothers, Theophilus and Henry
Youngs. Theoplilus suddenly dis
appeared one day in 1870, aud in due
course of time the widow sought to
administer ON his share of the estate
for her children. This was resisted
by Henry on the ground that his
brother was not dead, and now, after
years of litigation, the dead man turns
up, and what makes the affair more
complicated is that the wife denies
the new conner is the husband Of her
heart, and he vows that he would
rather undergo another ten years of
exile than have an interview Will, the