The Iola register., 1880-06-25
GYPSY GOLDEN.

TINE and tide drifted me to the shores
of England. Inclination and the train
carried me to Rochester, the quaint,
old-fashioned cathedral town immor-
talized by Dickens in edwin brood. -
Imagine reaching the place by train!
What a rude sweep that gave to pre-
conceived romance. Vanished for
evermore all visions of stage coaches;
of the tavern with relays of horses and
mugs of cool frothy ale; of the corpulent
landlord, with jovial face, rubicund
nose and garrulous tongue: of the os-
tier, forever chewing q wisp of straw;
and the chambermaid, with a distract
ingly pretty cap setting off her coquet-
tish face. Did they get into the old
coaches at the first whistle of the first
locomotive and trundle off to fairy
land? Did they 60 west? Or, have
they gone to join the lords and ladies of
long ago, knights-errant and Crusaders,
Don Quixote and Jack-the-giant-killer,
in the realm of imagination ruled over
by Mother Goose?
"Train or no train." said I to myself
as stood upon the platform, "this is
Rochester, and if there is grain of ro-
nance left in the old place l will un-
earth it." could not with impunity
resist the offer of the porter to carry
my trunk, but I rejected the proposal
of a man dressed in tweed suit of
antiquated make to test the New
Railway Hotel"
L left the modern porter and the star
ing new station and went out into the
road, as new as it is possible for a road
to be without being under process of
construction and the sunlight glaring
down upon it and reflected back into
the eyes until they ached again. Here
and there its gravelly banks were Or
namented with tufts of frowzy grass,
contemplating one of which stood a
forlorn sheep with patient eyes, evi-
dently waiting for more to grow be-
fore considering it worth his while to
begin dinner. Gradually as proceed
ed, the obnoxious newness at which I
took SO serious offense became inter-
spersed with much that was old-fash-
ioned and dirty.
When I entered the High street, al
most the first object that caught my eye
was the ''queer old clock that projects
over the pavement out of a grave, red
brick building, as if Time carried on
business there and hung out his sign,"
and l knew that at length had reached
the home of the Worshipful Master
Richard Watts, of Richard Doubledick,
the Reverend Septimus Crisparkle, Miss
Twinkleton and of Jasper. half ex-
pected to meet the pretty Rosa Bud
coming down the street under the shad-
ow of the out-stretching, oddly-carved
wooden gables, arm in arm with Helena
Landless.
In the absence of the wayside inn for
which my soul yearned, l stopped under
protest at hotel. However, it was de-
old, perhaps not quite so
clean as the effeminacy of our latter
day civilization demands, but by way
of recompense offered as many low
projections against which it was easy
to knock ones head as the most an
cient of taverns could possibly have
done.
l retired to my room and my past life
came back and haunted me. 1t had
been an exemplary life, one long, pure,
childlike existence, spent for
the most part on the Stock Exchange.
Toward midnight l wandered forth in
search of the romantic. As 1 passed
the Office the clerk eyed me.
The great, projecting clock which was
now illuminated, not from the inside |
but the outside, showed me that it want
ed but fifteen minutes to midnight. The
High street was entirely deserted, save
by three drunken sailors who were roll |
ing and pitching along the sidewalk as
if stiff breeze were blowing and the |
good ship Rochester" was heeling to !
[eeward dreadfully. Having run foul |
of a lamp-post, they struck up that ey-
tune of "Nancy Lee" 1 fled |