Morning journal and courier., 1880-12-27
Weary of a Hermit's Life.

Looking for a Wife After Lonely Life
of Forty Years in a Dismal Gave.
Austin Sheldon, who has lived a hermit s
| life for over forty years in a deep and dismal
| cave in the wilds of Lehman township, Pike
county, eight miles from Dingman's Ferry,
Pa, has recently come to the conclusion that
he could enjoy the remainder of his days
more comfortably by taking unto himself a
wife. He has always until within few
months expressed bitter hatred for the fair
| sex in consequence of a disappointment in
| love when he was young man.
Sheldon was born in Connecticut, near the
village of Branford, in 1906. He lived at
home, his father being a wealthy farmer, I'M
til arriving at mans estate. Then he be-
came enamoured of young and accom-
plished woman in the immediate neighbor-
hood, and they became engaged. The
woman's parents were averse to the match
and broke it off by sending their daughter
to distant boarding school She was sent
away in the night without Sheldon's knowl-
edge. AS soon as Sheldon learned that
she had gone he started out to find her. He
travelled from State to State, and spent the
greater part of his money in the search At
length, failing to find her, he grew despond-
emit and threatened repeatedly to take his own
life.
One night, after his family had retired,
Sheldon deserted his home without the
knowledge of his parents. His prolonged
absence alarmed the family, who, after scour-
ing the neighborhood in vain for the missing
man, came to the conclusion that he had COM
mitted suicide. They firmly believed that he
was dead until, a few years ago, his where
abouts were made known by q paragraph in
the Surs. Sheldon walked from Connecticut
to Milford, the county seat of Pike county,
Pa, where he purchased small, uncultivat-
ed tract of land in Lehman township. AS
there was no clearing within several miles of
him, and having no money to build house,
he sought cave in the rocks, and subsisted
been his home. Day by day Sheldon grew
more and more averse to seeing any one, and
for years he would secrete himself If he saw
a stranger passing near his abode. But of
recent years he has grown more sociable, and
strangers are welcomed to his dismal cave.
Sheldon has lived without companion of
any kind for upward of forty years, and, not
withstanding his advanced age, and the fact
that he has had many hairbreadth escapes
from death by animals, forest fires and expo
sure to the cold, he still expresses his inten--
ton of spending the remainder of his days in
his gloomy abode. He has for the past two
years been receiving letters from relatives in
Connecticut, urging him to abandon his
wretched home and return to his native State,
where he might live and not want, but to all
such entreaties he has turned deaf ear
His quarters are about the same to-day
as they were when he began his hermit
life, only the surrounding country
is more thickly populated. The old
hermit uses no stove, but does his cooking
over a stone fireplace. He sleeps in an old
rocking-chair, and uses blocks of wood for
chairs. He has no light at night, except that
coming from the fireplace. He has not shaw
ed in over forty years, and a thick, shaggy
beard covers his face, and his hair is grizzly
gray. He is as deaf as an adder, and has
been SO for years. Persons, who frequently
visit him through curiosity, converse with
him by writing on a slate.
Notwithstanding the land the hermit owns
is not worth the taxes, he entertains the be-
lief that untold wealth lies buried beneath
the surface. He is continually exploring
among the rocks in the hope of discovering
some kind of mineral Since he has taken It
into his head to marry, he has been scontin-
ually on the road in search of companion
He called at the house of young and re-
spectacle widow few weeks ago, and offered
to marry her The woman made no reply
but seizing kettle of boiling water, caused
the intruder to make a hasty retreat Shell
don has since been making matrimonial calls
in another direction. He is a fit subject for
a lunatic asylum. He is growing very feeble
and his death by freezing may be recorded
before the close of the present month.-Neso
York Sun.